Worst Ski Trip Ever
by sourpopsicles15
Summary: (Yes, I know the title sucks. The story isn't as bad, I promise. XD) Danny's class is going on a ski trip. On the way, their bus runs out of gas and Danny finds himself with one problem after another. He is focusing on keeping his peers in the dark about his ghostly alter-ego, and trying to keep them alive at the same time. Set after D-Stabilized. Rated T for language.
1. Road Trip

**Chapter 1**

**Lancer P.O.V.**

It was all William Lancer could do to not jump out the window of the bus he was currently driving.

"Are we there yet, _abuelo_? Every inch of my flawless skin is freezing!" Complained Paulina Sanchez. She was perhaps the most snobby, high-maintenance student Lancer had taught in all his years. The old teacher sighed, ignoring the fact that Ms. Sanchez had just called him 'Grandpa' in her native language. He had taken it upon himself to learn what the spanish word had meant after the last ten times he'd been called it.

"Not yet, Ms. Sanchez. We are still a few hours away from the hotel." Mr. Lancer spoke as calmly as he could. There was a collective groan from from behind him. "I told you all to pack for the weather, so if you're cold it's nobodies fault but your own." He left it at that and returned his attention to the snowy, deserted highway ahead of them.

**Danny P.O.V.**

As I looked out the window in the back row of the bus, I internally sighed at what Lancer had said. I don't want to be on this stupid bus any longer than I have to be. The A-List members have been complaining about the cold for the past hour. They were too proud and 'cool' to bring serious winter clothing, so of course they were all cold.

I broke away from my thoughts when I heard Tucker's cry of despair."A few hours?! How does Lancer expect me to survive that long? There's no service, Shirley ran out of battery hours ago AND WE HAVE NO FOOD!"

Sam and Valerie rolled their eyes, and I mockingly looked at my wrist, pretending there was a watch there. I gasped theatrically. "Tuck! You just missed your 3:32 feeding time! Somebody call an ambulance!"

Tucker looked at me indignantly. Valerie giggled and took his hand to comfort him. The two had started dating a few weeks after she found out about my ghostly alter-ego. Even Sam had Valerie credit for how well she took it, and Sam is a hard girl to impress. I laughed and playfully punched Tucker's arm. Then I leaned on the window, and stared out at the growing blizzard.

~Flashback to about a month earlier~

'Gemini,' I thought as I mentally pointed out the constellation. I sat, perched on the edge of one of the tallest buildings in Amity Park. It was around 10:30 pm, and I was in ghost form, admiring the stars. 'Taurus' I smiled at the other constellation. I had been at this for about twenty minutes, testing my knowledge of the stars.

"I should to do this more often," I said to myself with a smile.

"Do what?", came a voice from behind me.

I fell off the roof in surprise, and I was hanging on to the edge of the building when the owner of the voice approached me. 'Valerie.' I thought with sudden panic.

The Red Huntress surprised me then. She laughed, and said "Only you, Phantom, would forget you can fly just as you fell off a roof."

I blushed green and was about to pull myself back onto the roof when Valerie held her hand out to me. I glanced at it suspiciously for a moment, then took it. She helped me back onto the roof.

"Hey Red. What's up?" I asked while rubbing the back of my neck, hoping to make small talk. I sat back down on the edge of the building, and let my glowing green eyes wander the street below the huntress and I. She sat down next to me before answering.

"I'm ok. I was just flying by when I saw you up here. Something on your mind?"

I was surprised by how nice she was being, she wasn't even holding an ecto-gun.

I replied, the shock evident in my voice, "I'm fine, I was just looking at the constellations." I sighed and looked up again. "I've wanted to be an astronaut since I was a kid, but I don't think I'll be able to now that I'm…." .._dead..._ The unspoken word hung in the air for a moment before I motioned at myself, my _ghostliness._ I glanced up at Valerie who was just staring off at the city.

Then Valerie, the girl who had been hunting me for _months, _turned to me and said "I'm sorry, Phantom…"

For about two seconds, my human heart stopped beating from shock. My eyes were probably as wide as frisbees. "For what?" I asked when the shock wore off slightly. Valerie wasn't the type of girl who admitted she was wrong. Did she know..?

"For not listening to you. After that thing with Danielle... I was so confused. Confused about her, confused about you...," Valerie trailed off. When she continued, there was a hint of malice in her voice, but it wasn't directed at me. "I went back, after you flew off. I went back to check on Masters." She spat the word out as if it were a curse word.

I realized then what happened. "You saw him transform, didn't you?" I asked cautiously. She nodded.

I stood up and started pacing the roof. "Ooh man this is bad… You haven't spoken to him yet have you?" I asked with fear evident in my voice. If she'd told Plasmius that she knew, he'd think I told her. He'd be pissed, to put it _lightly. _Who knows what kind of trouble he could cause Valerie and I down the road...

Valerie looked slightly confused at my fearful reaction, and a bit suspicious. "Why does it matter?" she asked, her voice mirroring the suspicion on her face.

I laughed sarcastically. "Oh, I dunno. He could only kill all my friends and family if he decides to blame me for your finding out. Except my mom of course. He wants her to be his wife, because that fruitloop is too stubborn to try online dating. I also suggested he get a cat, which I'm pretty sure he did. He probably named the damn thing after my mom too. Did I mention that he's the biggest fruitloop I've ever met? Well in case I didn't, VLAD PLASMIUS IS THE BIGGEST FRUITLOOP EVER." I yelled the last part so loud, some of the citizens walking along the street below us looked up. "And then after he's through with all the people I care about, he'll kidnap me and ship me off to the GIW to make me a lab rat for the rest of my lif- uhhh afterlife!" I finished lamely before I revealed something important. I turned to Valerie, who had been completely silent throughout my ranting.

Valerie looked so shocked that I almost laughed, but I decided against it. I didn't want to do anything that might send any negative vibes. 'Oops...' I thought to myself. I mentally face palmed, I probably should have thought about that _before_ I started sarcastically ranting to her about Vlad.

Valerie's voice tore me from my thoughts, "Your family is still alive?" She asked with a sad voice.

I froze, literally. Frost began forming around my fingers and in my hair, and the temperature around us dropped a few degrees. 'Stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid! Come on, Fenton! How did you let yourself slip like that?' I mentally berated myself.

Valerie eyed the frost curiously and took my reaction as a yes. She bombarded me with questions, "Do they live here? Do they know about you being a ghost? Who are they?" I shot her a look, and she quieted for a moment, before asking, "Are they the reason you protect Amity Park?"

I thought about my answer for a moment. "I'll answer those in order. Yes, they live here. No, they don't know I'm a ghost. I'm not gonna tell you who they are, not yet." I shot her an apologetic look, "And no. I defend Amity Park because it's the right thing to do, and because it wouldn't be overrun by ghosts at all if it weren't for me." The last part of that sentence was a bit of a test for Valerie. I assume that in her mind, there will be two choices. She can pull out an ecto-weapon and find out what I did to make ghosts invade Amity, or she could be patient and listen to what I have to say. If she passes my test, I can tell her the truth about me, about everything. I didn't want to have to lie to her anymore. I feel _so _guilty when I do.

Valerie was silent for a moment. I could see the wheels turning in her mind. Silently she looked up. "It was never your fault was it? You do try to protect Amity. You aren't evil." She asked.

"Thanks, Valerie, for being open-minded." I smiled; that's a pass for Valerie. She smiled back at me.

"Hey Valerie?"

"Yea?"

"Can you keep a secret?"

~End Flashback~

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

Danny woke up, slowly. He left his eyes closed while he listened to the conversation his friends were having.

Valerie asked Sam, "So, how did you and Tuck convince 'Mr. Hero Complex' over here to come on this trip?" She said this while motioning at Danny.

Sam laughed. "It wasn't easy, eventually we threatened to suck him into the thermos if he didn't agree to come."

"Tough love" Valerie quipped with a smile.

"Maybe a bit, but he _really_ needs this vacation. He's been almost as 'work-aholic' as Jazz these days. He needs to lighten up." Sam leaned back against Danny's supposedly sleeping form.

"Hey! I'm not that bad. I take breaks every now and again." Danny said indignantly, surprising Sam, who'd been leaning on him. She let out an uncharacteristic squeal and almost fell off the bus seat.

Tucker laughed. "Hey, no offense dude, but I'm pretty sure the word 'relax' has erased itself from your mental dictionary. I can't even remember the last time you took a night off to play 'Doom' with me."

Danny chuckled at that. "Ok, you make a fair point. I'll try to relax while we're on this trip, but I'm not promising anything."

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Back in Amity Park, Johnny 13 roared through the Amity Park streets, looking to blow off some steam. He and Kitty had just had a _huge_ fight. She was complaining about the colour of his new jacket, because apparently it clashed with her outfit. Soon the small argument escalated to insults such as 'Johnny your bike sucks.'

"Dammit, Phantom…" Johnny mumbled to himself. The kid was never around when Johnny actually _wanted_ a fight.

'Maybe he's still in school.' Johnny thought. He took a sharp right towards Casper High. Upon arrival, Johnny phased himself and his bike through the front entrance, ignoring the blaring Ghost Alarm and the screaming students. He rode through the halls until he passed a billboard. A flyer on the billboard made him pause.

"Sophomore Class Ski Trip, permission forms at front office.." Johnny read aloud.

_Oh. No wonder he hasn't shown up. Phantom's a sophomore. He must be taking a vacation._ Johnny smirked.

He drove out of the school, calculating a route that would let him successfully cut off the students. Unfortunately for Phantom, superheroes don't get vacations.


	2. How Curiosity Almost Killed the Jock

**Hey guys, I totally forgot the disclaimer last chapter, but whatever. I'll say it twice. **

**I do not own Danny Phantom,**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Enjoy. **

**Chapter 2**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

"TUCKER!" Danny cried out blushing.

"Dude, it's gonna happen, or you owe me like _over_ two hundred bucks for all the money I bet on you guys."

Tucker had just told Danny that this ski trip was the perfect opportunity to ask Sam out. The goth, along with Valerie, had moved closer to the front of the bus to talk to one of Valerie's other friends. Tucker wouldn't have started the conversation with Sam around, she would have killed him. Tucker looked over at Danny and rolled his eyes. His ever-so-clueless best friend was still blushing.

"Tucker, she's one of my best friends-" He was cut off by Tucker punching him in the arm.

"Hey!" Danny cried indignantly. Tucker shot him a glare.

Danny mumbled his next few words, "Ok, I may have a crush on Sam, but she doesn't like me back. If I tell her I like her it'll ruin our friendship." Danny sighed and leaned back on the seat of the bus.

"You're right. It'll _totally _ruin your friendship if you tell her, because as soon as you do she'll tell you she likes you back. Then you guys are going to go out and you can't be 'just friends' while you guys are _dating_. Then you'll both grow up and get married and have a kid and if its a boy you had _better_ name them Tucker cause I'm pretty much the reason you guys are gonna start dating in the first place."

Danny chuckled and looked out the window. He scowled at what he saw. It was blizzarding outside. He could barely see the road in front of them through all the snow.

"Dude," Danny said, "you've planned farther ahead in my life then _I_ have."

"Well _yeah._ You'd never be able to figure this kind of stuff on your own, bro. Oh, and by the way, if you name your kid after me, don't let Sam make them a vegetarian. Us Tuckers gotta have our meat."

Danny laughed. "Ok, fine. I'll ask Sam out sometime over the trip. I just have to wait for the right moment."

Tucker was beaming. "Thats awesome dude. You gotta let me know as soon as you do find that moment. I gotta program the exact time and place into my PDA so I have solid proof for when I collect all the money I bet on you guys."

Tucker started doing some evil cackle thing when he said the word money; which made Danny laugh as well. The girls, of course, chose this moment to return to their rightful spots at the back of the bus.

As she sat down next to Valerie in the backseat, Sam asked "What's so funny?"

The boys' laughing died down to a bad case of the giggles, and Tucker managed to say "Nothing."

Tucker whispered something else to Danny, and the halfa was laughing uncontrollably. Tucker smiled evilly, and Valerie looked at her boyfriend with suspicion written all over her face. Danny, she trusted. It was Tucker that made her worry.

_Oh, the irony.._ Valerie thought. _I n__ever thought I'd say this, but I trust a ghost more than I trust_ _my __own boyfriend._ She giggled at the thought.

Sam leaned over to her. "How is it that Danny, the guy who's _half ghost_, looks more innocent than Tucker right now?"

Valerie laughed even harder. Somehow, the words sounded even more bizarre coming from someone else. Sam joined in her laughing fit.

All four teens suddenly jerked forward when the bus came to a very abrupt stop.

Sam looked up, fully alert. She calmed down a bit when she saw that the bus wasn't under attack. She grumbled in discomfort; she'd been slightly winded when she'd been knocked into the back of the seat in front of her. "Dumb bus," she grumbled, then called out to Mr. Lancer, "What's going on? If we're stopping for food because of Tucker's incessant complaining , I swear to God, Tucker…"

"No, Ms. Manson, we are not stopping for food." (Tucker groaned at this.) "We are stopping because we are out of gas."

There was a cacophony of shouts and complaints from the students.

A handful of kids screeched, "WHAT?" simultaneously.

One boy said, "Lancer if this is the first joke you've ever made, IT SUCKS."

Other students were silent but repeatedly hit their heads on the seats in front of them.

Suddenly, Kwan asked, "Buses run on gas?" Everyone looked at him incredulously.

"What did you think," Dash said sarcastically, "a bunch of tiny goblins ran around in hamster wheels to move the thing?"

Lester spoke up in the back, saying "Actually, goblins are generally at least the size of a small toaster oven and they certainly wouldn't fit in hamster wheels."

"Who asked you, _geek._" Dash snapped at Lester. The words seemed to set off a chain reaction. The nerds/geeks all started defending their comrade, while the A-List started dishing out whatever dumb insults they could think of.

Meanwhile, in the back row of seats, Danny's friends were calm. If worse came to worse, Danny could always zoom off to bring help.

_Hopefully,_ Danny thought, _it will not come to that._

"Hey, Danny?" Sam asked.

Danny broke from his thoughts when he heard his name, "Yea?"

"Is there anything you can do to keep the bus from completely freezing over while we wait for Lancer to come up with something?" Sam's teeth were chattering slightly as she spoke. Danny only realized after he saw this that the bus was as cold as it was. It made sense that the bus was getting colder, the engine wasn't doing anything to keep them warm anymore.

"Oh, sorry." Danny said, "I didn't really notice how cold it was. I blame the cold ghost core." Danny rubbed the back of his neck in embarrassment. Danny was silent for a moment, deep in thought.

"I suppose I could use the snow falling outside. Snow can be a great insulator; if I can pull it closer to the bus it could trap some of the heat." Danny concentrated on his ghost core, while trying not to transform. Danny frowned. While he'd gotten better at using his powers in human form, it still wasn't easy. Danny felt a chill as he accessed his cyrokinesis. His eyes turned a lighter blue and glowed slightly. To the passengers inside of the bus, the blizzard seemingly increased. There was enough snow that no one could really see outside the windows, so they assumed the snow was just falling faster. From outside the bus, the mound of snow sort of looked like an overlarge igloo.

"COOOOL!" Dash beamed at how much snow there was. "Dude," he nudged Kwan's shoulder, "we should go out there and check out the snow. There's probably enough there to make, like, fifty snow footballs! Then we could throw them at the losers!"

"I dunno," Kwan sounded skeptical. "It could be dangerous. We should probably stay in the bus…"

"You know, you choose the worst moments to suddenly become smart, Kwan. It kinda makes you a killjoy, sometimes. I mean, like, less than ten minutes ago you didn't know buses ran on gas."

Kwan glared at his friend, but said nothing.

Dash smirked, victorious. "Alright, we'll go check it out when everyones sleeping, I don't want to get Lancer mad."

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Soon after Danny used his powers on the snow, the bus returned to a warmer temperature. When Danny was confident that all his classmates and Mr Lancer had fallen asleep, he used his cyrokinesis to poke a small hole in the wall of snow, so Danny could watch for cars. If a car passed and the passengers of the vehicle saw the 'bus-gloo' (Tucker named it. Danny will not be held accountable for that monstrosity of a name.) then Danny's secret could be in serious jeopardy. Danny made sure that he had his cyrokinesis at the ready in case he had to blow the snow away quickly.

Danny waited for the better part of an hour, and was starting to get tired. Danny had to force himself to stay alert. Eventually, he couldn't keep himself awake any longer, and he let the darkness take over. He was sleeping for all of 20 minutes before his eyes snapped open. There was a hole in his wall of snow, and it wasn't his own.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

~Right after Danny fell asleep~

Dash's eyes peeked open and he looked at his favorite punching bag. Danny was now slumped against his window, his goth friend laying almost right on top of him. Dash smirked, _Lovebirds,_ he thought to himself. He nudged Kwan. "Kwan, wake up dude. Fentoad _finally_ fell asleep. God, how much coffee did the dude drink this morning?" He heard his friend chuckle.

Dash nudged his friend once more. "Come on, you lazy ass. Get up. We're going exploring."

Kwan groaned slightly, but got up. Then Dash woke up two more of the football players, Matt and Jake, and explained to them what he and Kwan were doing. Matt and Jake agreed to come. They all grabbed the only winter clothing they had, and stole some boots from other students. The four football players navigated the aisle, trying not to wake any of the other students. There weren't many. In fact, there were so little students that only Mr. Lancer had to come with the students. The school figured that he would be enough. Dash smirked. _Sometimes, adults could be _so _dumb_. Dash broke out of his thoughts, Matt had reached the front of the bus. Dash pointed towards the lever that opens the bus door, and Matt nodded his understanding. He pulled it slowly, in an attempt to not wake up his fellow classmates and the teacher. To the surprise of all four jocks, the doors didn't budge. Matt was a pretty strong dude.

Dash whispered as loudly as he dared at Matt. "What the hell, dude?"

Matt looked back, too dumbstruck to speak.

Dash impatiently pushed past Matt and pulled the lever as hard as he could, and the door seemed to start to open, but something pulled it back. Dash tried again and watched the door as he pulled. The door opened slightly, and Dash watched, shocked, as the _snow_ pushed it back into place. The other three jocks had watched the door as well and were shocked into silence just as Matt had been. At the back of the bus, Danny grimaced in his sleep as his cyrokinesis warned him about the attempted breach.

Dash shook off the shock and motioned for his friends to come closer. "There is no way that four football players aren't stronger than a bit of bad weather. You two," he motioned at Matt and Kwan, "when Jake and I pull this lever, you guys pull that door open the rest of the way."

The four boys got into position, and Dash counted down from three on his fingers, and after one he and Jake pulled as hard as they could. The door opened a crack and Kwan and Matt joined the struggle. The door was forced open the rest of the way, and at that moment Danny's eyes flew open, glowing blue. Danny jumped up, waking up Sam in the process. The four football players looked up in surprise, but all they saw was a light blue glow before Danny was hopping over the bus seats as if he weighed nothing. Mere seconds later he was tackling Kwan and Matt _at the same time._ The two football players let go of the door in surprise and it snapped shut. They hit the bottom of the bus with Danny pretty much on top of them. They were too shocked to move as Danny reached towards the bus control panel and turned on all the lights. Dash and Jake had not moved the entire time.

The other students and Mr Lancer all sat up groggily from the sudden light, but snapped to attention when they heard the surprisingly angry voice of Danny Fenton. "Are you guys _INSANE? _Dash, this might just be the dumbest thing you've ever tried to do, I swear… What would you have done if the doors had gotten stuck open? Then we'd all freeze to death because _almost no one brought serious winter clothes_! And then what if you'd all gotten trapped outside? Did you expect us all to go risk our lives out there into a freaking _BLIZZARD_ to save you? I'm pretty sure all of us who didn't try to brave the storm have enough common sense to not risk the lives of _twenty_ for _FOUR_, no matter how good at football you are! Do _ANY _of you even have _BRAINS?"_ Only the four kids he was yelling at saw Danny's eyes flash blood red. The four boys paled.

Danny felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned around to see Sam. She looked like she was holding back a fit of laughter. Danny furrowed his brow in confusion, and turned back to the four idiots in front of him. He snapped out of the angry fit he'd been in and laughed himself. The four jocks that had teased him since elementry school looked as if they'd all shrunken a few inches, and were about to soil themselves. Tucker came up the aisle behind Danny and snapped a picture of the five boys and Sam with a camera that he'd pulled out of his backpack.

Mr. Lancer broke free of his shock and cried out, "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, PEOPLE! What's going on here?!"

Danny scoffed, "Why don't you ask these 'muscle for brains' here? I was just sleeping when I heard the door of the bus open, and _they_ were about to walk out of it."

Dash spoke up suddenly. "What the hell was up with your eyes there, Fen_toad_?"

Danny felt frost forming around his fingers. Danny quickly hid them in his pockets. "Uhh, whatever you saw must be a trick of the light, or somethi-" Danny was cut off by his ghost sense. He paled.

Mikey, a nerd often picked on by Dash and Kwan, spoke up. "I don't mean to interrupt whatever.._ this_... is, but there seems to be a vehicle approaching."

Danny's entire body whipped around towards Mikey, who was looking out his window.

_Huh. _Danny thought. _I must've dropped the snow when I woke up…_

Danny followed Mikey's line of vision, and sure enough there was a light approaching. A_ motorcycle,_ Danny realized with a start. He could already hear the engine approaching, and there was only one headlight.

_Just what we need right now._ Danny thought with a scowl. As the motorcycle approached, Danny could make out two glowing green eyes.

"Johnny." Danny growled.


	3. Johnny Strikes

**Thanks to all the reviewers! Your support really helps! To reply to a couple-**

**Mistress Soul- I appreciate it XD thanks**

**JH24- Thanks for the comment about my Valerie/Phantom scene- I was wondering how I did with that. :) Dash and Kwan will, of course, continue to be their charming selves and are going to get Danny in a lot of trouble soon! **

**Inviso-Al- Johnny's plans are about to be revealed, so read on!**

**Coin- I'm absolutely going to continue this story! I always liked field trip fics so this is really fun for me. I'm glad you like it!**

**Ok, on to the story.**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 3**

"Johnny." Danny growled.

Tucker and Sam looked at each other, sharing looks of annoyance.

"Great," Sam said sarcastically. "Company."

"Any bets as to what he and Kitty are fighting about this time?" Tucker deadpanned.

The entire class, besides Valerie, (She was glaring out the window from the backseat,) looked at the trio with curiosity. Mr. Lancer was the first to question the three out loud, "You know who that is?"

"In case you couldn't tell by the glowing green eyes," Danny sighed with exasperation, "That's a ghost. His name is Johnny 13, and he's pretty common around Amity Park."

Dash perked up slightly, but he still seemed pretty shaken. His voice quivered slightly when he spoke. "The guy who usually rides his bike around with the hot, green haired ghost chick?"

Danny looked over at Dash questioningly. "Don't let Johnny hear you call her hot. They're dating and he gets _really_ jealous. I would know.." Danny muttered the last part so no one heard him. He winced when he thought back to the 'Kitty taking over Paulina's body and seducing him' incident.

Danny returned his attention to the fast-approaching motorbike, trying to formulate a plan. "Hey Val," he called out to his friend across the bus.

"Yea?" She called back.

"Do you by any chance have any..?" He cut off, not wanting to reveal anything about his ghost hunting friend.

"Just a couple pairs of Fenton Phones that I grabbed from your place." She said after looking through her bag for a moment.

"How many?"

"Eight."

Danny was silent for a moment, before he looked out the window. Johnny had stopped about 20 metres away from the bus. Johnny had stood up from his bike and looked as if he was about to approach the bus. He met Johnny's eyes, and the two ghosts just stared at each other for about 30 seconds before Danny plastered an innocent smile on his face and he mockingly saluted in Johnny's direction. He saw the ghost outside the bus frown, but he sat back down on his bike patiently. Danny's stare had successfully warned him.

Danny turned back to Valerie. "Ok, take a pair for yourself, then give one to Lancer, Dash (Dash gave him a baffled look), Mikey, Star, Sam, Tucker and I. Make sure they're all on. Hurry." Danny double checked his choices in his mind. He, Sam, Tuck, Val and Lancer were all obvious. Mikey was respected by most nerds, so he would be their group leader. Danny would have given a pair to Paulina because the cheerleaders would follow her, but Danny had realized near the end of freshman year that she was _really _irritating. He didn't have time for her incessant complaining over the radios. The second most respected cheerleader was Star, who was much less annoying, so he chose her instead. The last group that he'd needed to cover was the football players. As much as Danny hated to admit it, between Dash and Kwan, Dash was more cool headed. Danny had found that out during the 'puny' incident. Any student that didn't classify in any of his three groups could follow Lancer.

Satisfied with his choices, Danny moved to the very front of the bus so that everyone could see him. He spoke loudly and clearly, "Everyone listen up. Valerie is handing out one pair of Fenton Phones to each of my appointed group leaders. Group leaders, the Fenton Phones are a way for everyone wearing a pair to communicate. Anyone who is not a group leader, find one and stick with them. We have to get out of here, and the best chance we have is splitting up, unfortunately. Sam, Tuck, Val and I will find out what Johnny wants, and the rest of you stay here. Group leaders, if I give the word, you will take your groups out and hide in a spot nearby where you can still see the bus. Sam, Tuck, you guys check in your bags, see if you have any ecto-weapons on you. Sam, if you brought a thermos, that will do fine." Tucker found nothing in his bag but Sam found a thermos, and she grinned victoriously.

Mr Lancer spoke up incredulously, "No way. I cannot allow you kids to take a risk like this. There is a dangerous ghost outside and you four just plan on marching out there with a soup thermos?"

Danny replied calmly, while walking towards the back of the bus and opening his own duffel bag, "I can take care of myself, Mr. Lancer, and so can my friends. Besides, we're not much safer in this bus. It's not ghost-proof."

Danny pulled a small ecto-gun from his bag and tossed it to Sam, who caught it with ease. Her lips curled into a fully satisfied smirk as she examined the weapon. Danny proceeded, with no more argument from Lancer, and pulled out three more of the same weapon, putting one in the waistline of his signature jeans. He passed the remaining two to Tucker and Valerie.

"Are you kids even trained to _use _those weapons?" Mr. Lancer asked.

Valerie grinned mischieviously. She took aim from her spot at the back end of the bus in less than two seconds and fired.

There was a smoking hole in the direct center of the tree-shaped air freshener that hung from the rearview mirror of the bus.

The four strode confidently towards the front of the bus, ignoring the shocked expressions of their peers.

"If I need you guys need to run, I'm gonna yell 'Phantom' real loud into the Fenton Phones, ok?" Danny smirked before he stepped outside the bus, followed by his three best friends who were grinning ear to ear from the inside joke.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

~Before Johnny was first spotted by Mikey~

Johnny had just left Amity Park when suddenly a ghost portal appeared out of nowhere. Having no time to break, johnny flew through it, and landed in a large room. Johnny cut the engine of his bike and looked up to see a large viewing screen.

The screen showed a large bus, driving along a deserted highway. It was blizzarding. Johnny watched, amused, as the bus started to slow down and pulled off to the side of the road and stopped suddenly. The bus had run out of gas.

"They're almost as unlucky as me," Johnny smirked.

"Indeed," A voice echoed through the room, causing Johnny to jump.

Johnny turned around to see an observant. The powerful ghost was watching the screen. Johnny paled slightly, remembering that only ghosts who had committed the most serious crimes were handed over to the observants council.

The green, one eyed ghost turned to Johnny, "Johnny 13, yes?"

Johnny looked at the ghost suspiciously. "Why am I here? I didn't do anything wrong, did I?"

"Oh, no. I just need your help." The ghost said, shrugging slightly.

Johnny's eyes narrowed. "You pretty much kidnapped me, dude. I don't exactly owe you any favors."

"You care about the well being of the Ghost Zone, don't you?"

Johnny nodded. "I guess, but if it's such a big deal you should probably leave whatever it is to some stronger ghost."

"I intend to leave the hard part to 'some stronger ghost'," The observant said this part with quotations, "I just need you to bring him here."

Johnny sighed. "Why can't you just get him yourself? Why not just sneak a portal in front of him? And, plus, I was busy before I was forced here."

"I can not make a portal big enough to transport an entire school bus to the ghost zone. I am too weak in my current state. As for your having been busy, this will not get in the way of your plans to 'blow off steam'. You and I, we are searching for the same ghost."

Johnny looked confused for a moment. He suddenly perked up in realization. The bus on the viewing screen, a stronger ghost.. '_Sophomore class ski trip'.._

"You want _me_ to kidnap _Danny Phantom?_ You might want to reconsider dude, 'cause I'm fairly sure that neither of us have the power to hold him. Isn't your council planning on crowning him the new Ghost King when he turns eighteen? Why would you even want to _try_ to do this?"

The observant sighed. "In order, then. Yes, I want you to kidnap him for me. For holding him, I have a plan. Yes he will be the King, and why I am doing this is none of your concern."

Johnny massaged his temples. "You could just ask him to come over."

The observant snorted. "You honestly think he'd agree? You're welcome to try, of course.."

Johnny contemplated this for a moment, then sighed in defeat. "Ok, your plan better be pretty damn good. My girlfriend will kill you if I don't survive this."

~Back in the human world~

Johnny had been teleported back to the human's realm by the observant that he'd encountered. The plan was risky, but Johnny knew that he didn't have a choice. When an observant asks for a favor, you don't say no. Unless you want to die. Again.

When the large snow mound came into view, Johnny was impressed.

_Well, what did you expect?_ Johnny mused to himself. _Phantom's a smart little man._

Johnny meant it, too. Using snow as an insulator to keep his companions warm was smart.

Johnny broke out of his thought's when the large mound moved, but whipped back into place with a resounding snap. Johnny raised an eyebrow, _If Phantom's the one who put up that big wall then why try to break it down? Is he hurt or something? _Someone attempted to break out a second time, but the wall of snow moved right back into place. There was a longer pause. The third time someone tried to exit the bus, they succeeded, and a large hole was made in the snow fortress. A bright blue glow shone through the snow near the back of the bus. Moments later, the wall of snow fell. Johnny had excellent night vision, so he could easily see what was going on inside the bus, even from a distance. There was a fast moving figure bounding over the bus seats. _Phantom,_ Johnny realized. _The blue glow must have been his 'ice powers' eyes..._

Phantom reached the opposite end of the bus. Johnny realized that someone had been trying to open the door of the bus. He could see two large boys holding the door open, but before they could leave the safety of the bus Phantom-in-human-form tackled them. The door snapped shut a third time when the two boys accidently let it go.

Suddenly the bus lights turned on, and Johnny could see Phantom standing menacingly over four boys, two of which were still on the ground from when they were tackled by the halfa.

Johnny felt a slight ripple in the energy around Phantom. Johnny knew immediately what it meant, he'd felt it many times before. Johnny caught Phantom's eyes flashing red; the half-ghost was _really_ mad at those boys for trying to break out. Johnny laughed, those four dudes were in _very _deep shit.

Johnny looked back to the bus. After a minute or two of yelling at the boys, Phantom's gothic girlfriend had calmed him down and the tech dude was taking pictures of the four boys, who were probably scarred for life.

Johnny looked at the other passengers, and one of them spotted him. The kid who spotted him was a scrawny little dude with glasses. Glasses kid pointed Johnny out to Danny, and Danny's sharp eyes spotted him outside the window almost immediately. Glowing green eyes met the halfa's blue ones.

"That's my cue…" Johnny mumbled to himself, and sped off towards the schoolbus.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Dash looked out the window of the bus as the loser squad approached the biker ghost. Dash listened through the radios in his ears with his group, the football team, huddled around him. He wasn't really paying attention to the conversation his friends were having. He was seriously confused about Fenton. For one, what was up with his eyes? First they were glowing blue, then they flashed that creepy red. Was there like, a ghost in him or something? Then there was also he was doing _freaking parkour_ of the bus seats, and then he expertly tackled two football players _twice his size!_ He looked over at the three other boys who'd suffered Fenturd's wrath, and they looked about as freaked out as he felt.

"Have they said anything yet?" Kwan asked Dash.

Dash sighed, "Not yet..wait, here-" He took one of his Fenton Phones out. He found the button on the side that controlled the volume, and raised it as much as he could. The sound was pretty good, so most of the boys huddled around Dash could hear it. Danny spoke, and Dash's whole group could hear him.

He called out to the biker ghost, "To what do I owe the pleasure, Johnny?"

Johnny's voice was harder to hear because he wasn't wearing Fenton Phones, but those inside the bus could still mostly hear him. "The usual. Kitty's ticked off for no reason whatsoever, and so I've come to make your life a bit more miserable."

"Johnny, the longer you put off apologizing, the more pissed she's gonna get." Sam said, irritated.

"Ok, I'll go apologize. Right after I finish kicking your asses." Johnny smiled mischieviously.

Danny frowned. "Go home, Johnny. I'm not doing this right now, come find me when I'm back from my vacation. Come on, guys." Danny motioned for his friends to follow him, and they turned back towards the bus.

Johnny smirked, and said something that the students in the bus couldn't hear, and suddenly a large, black, tar-like creature shot from the snowy ground. The students in the bus gasped. The thing shot through the air and hit Sam, who was immediately stuck in the creature. Sam's head was sticking out of the black thing's chest, as well as one of her arms and one of her combat boots. The creature returned to Johnny's side, Sam in tow.

Danny stopped mid-stride. He turned around to face Johnny, and the students in the bus felt a ripple in the air around them.

**Third Person P.O.V.**

Tucker spoke to Danny calmly. "Dude, Sam's fine. She's _fine._ Let's just get Johnny and his shadow in the thermos and be done with this."

Danny didn't appear to be listening. He looked over at Sam, and his blue irises went red for the second time that night. The student's in the bus gaped.

Tucker quickly spoke into his radio, "All of you get out of there. Go! _Phantom!" _Tucker yelled the code word that Danny had meant as a joke.

Just as he did, Danny calmly began approaching Johnny, who looked alarmed at the halfa's red irises.

"Shadow! _PROTECT!_" He yelled.

Shadow threw himself, with Sam still trapped inside him, at Danny, attempting to block his path. Danny paused, his eyes still glowing red. He smiled maliciously, while pulling his ecto gun out of the back of his jeans. The students hadn't moved, and Tucker didn't blame them. This was an interesting side to Danny that none of them recognized, of course they were curious.

Danny stared down the shadow, and suddenly threw the ecto gun. It landed on the ground in front of Sam and the Shadow. No one moved. The students in the bus were confused. Tucker and Valerie were almost laughing at the expression on Johnny's face. He had a look that crossed between fear, shock and confusion. Sam looked amused. She knew what Danny was up too.

Danny raised his hands in the surrender pose. Johnny's face finally decided on which emotion to convey. It chose confusion.

"Uhhhh, dude? You ok?" Johnny asked suspiciously.

"Me? I'm fine. You? Not so much." Danny replied darkly, eyes still blood red.

Danny's hands tilted slightly, and he fired a ecto-blast, knowing he was going to have a hell of a time trying to explain it to the people on the bus later. The blast hit the gun, and the weapon exploded right in front of the shadow. The blast didn't hurt Sam because it was entirely made of ecto energy, but the bright light dissolved the shadow within seconds. Johnny doubled over as he lost large amounts of energy. Danny was about to approach Johnny when Sam picked herself off the ground. He entirely forgot his anger and he rushed to her side. His eyes faded back to blue. Johnny let out an internal sigh of relief. He stood up, and brushed the snow off of his jacket.

_Ok, Johnny._ He gave himself a mental pep talk. _You can do this man. Sound convincing._

"Ok, little man. You win, I'm gone.." Johnny said.

Danny looked at him suspiciously. "Ok…"

Johnny plopped down on his motorcycle and drove by the bus, and just as he passed it he activated his new and improved portable ghost portal. The observant had convinced Technus to fix up Johnny's old portal generator (the one he stole from the Fentons, that Danny mostly destroyed). Now, the portal it generated was way bigger.

"Shadow! Get the bus!" Johnny's shadow had reformed, and though it wasn't at it's strongest, it still managed to grab the bus full of humans. Danny had been paying attention to Sam until he heard Tuck and Val yelling and swearing at Johnny to put it down. Danny was racing at the portal as fast as his legs could carry him, and he arrived at the portal just in time for the bus to be pulled through by Johnny's shadow. Danny swore violently.

Sam, Tucker and Valerie arrived at the portal a few seconds after Danny.

"Shit." Tucker said, with a defeated look on his face.

They all shared a look and walked the the portal after their classmates


	4. The Infinite Realms pt 1

**Thanks for the continued support guys! :D**

**By the way, I have a new community up. Its pretty much all of my favourite DP stories. Those stories inspired this one, sooo if you wanna check it out, it's called ****sourpopsicles15 DP Favourites.** **(I'm really uncreative with names. You probably already knew that from the title of this story.) **

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

As soon as Johnny stepped into the Infinite Realms he ordered Shadow to bring the bus to the Observants' Lair. The observant he'd had contact with had refered to the bus full of humans as 'security'. The halfa's heroic obsession would probably keep him in check. Shadow had just disappeared from sight with the bus when the portal rippled in preparation for new arrivals. It closed just after they passed through.

When Phantom walked into the Ghost Zone, Johnny felt a chill through his bones. He didn't know that so much hatred could be conveyed in one look.

Phantom's eyes met his, and the halfa let an unearthly growl escape his throat.

Johnny quickly did his best to speak without letting his voice shake. It was funny to think about how when the kid was fourteen he was one of the least scary ghosts out there, but now two years later you could see the depths of hell in the young halfa's eyes. They were cold and hard.

When Johnny finally found his voice, he tried his best to explain the situation. "Ok, ok wait-" He put his hands up in surrender as the teenage ghost approached, "Before you try to kill me, just hear me out."

Valerie clamped her hand over Danny's mouth, knowing full well that Danny was mad enough to use his wail if she didn't intervene. Danny made a few muffled, angry complaints. Valerie whispered in Danny's ear, "Danny, let's _not _use your wail to _completely obliterate _our only chance of finding the class. Even if said 'only chance' is a total jerk." She looked at Danny's face, checking his features. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw how much less furious he looked. Then she noticed something else. The Fenton Phones in his ears.

She looked back at Tucker and pointed at the Fenon Phones in Danny's ears with a questioning look on her face. Tucker pulled out his own Fenton Phones and examined them. Tucker was slightly confused. They should have heard something by now. The class had been weirdly silent, which meant one of two things were happening. One, the entire class was dead. That was unlikely though, the observants were smarter than that. That would put the entire ghost zone _and_ the human world in danger. The entire class dead could easily cause another _Dan_. The second possibility could be technical difficulties, their Fenton Phones could broken, or out of battery. Also, someone could blocking communication from being sent. Tucker furrowed his brow when he thought of all the possibilities. Tucker returned his attention to Valerie and shrugged.

Valerie didn't know anything about technology, so she'd leave worrying about the Fenton Phones to Tuck. Valerie looked back at Johnny and glared. "You have two minutes to convince me to not sick Danny on you, _spook._"

Johnny looked grateful, as much as he tried to hide it. "Ok, so here's the deal. I went to Amity Park looking for Phantom, here." he motioned in Danny's direction. "Because Kitty and I had a spaz. I wanted to blow off steam. I found out that you guys were on a field trip and I thought I'd come by and spice up your day." The halfa's eyes blazed green for a moment. "Before I could find you guys, a portal appears out of nowhere right in front of me while I'm driving and I can't brake in time, so I went through it. I ended up some big room with an _observant. _He tells me I gotta go get Phantom for him because they're having some big ghost zone crisis, or some such nonsense. He knew about my spaz with Kitty and he knew I was looking for _him_." He motioned at Danny again. "He also you were on a field trip and stuff. He told me to grab all the humans on the trip to make sure he cooperated or whatever. None of this is my idea, or choice, like, at all. No one says no to the Observants. It was totally all his idea, so letting Phantom destroy me would be totally unfair."

Valerie looked at him suspiciously, but relaxed her grip on Danny. Danny, taking his chance, pulled away from Valerie, but did not attack Johnny. Sam was looking around them with a calculating look on her face.

Tucker asked the question that was going through all of their minds. "Why do they want Danny?"

Johnny just shrugged. "I dunno. He didn't give me any details other than how to get you guys here. Now, we just have to go on foot to the observants' place."

Sam and Valerie shared a look, having a silent conversation. Valerie was still suspicious, but Sam was giving her a look that asked, _What other choice have we got? We are in the middle of nowhere! _

Valerie finally gave in. "Fine. Lead the way."

Danny looked at his friends incredulously.

"Are we _seriously _trusting this guy after he kidnapped our _entire class?_" Danny complained while glaring at Johnny, who seemed to shrink a few inches.

"We don't really have any other option." Sam said.

Danny transformed. His voice took on its ghostly echo so he sounded even darker when he said, "You guys could let me beat Johnny to his second death."

"Danny…" Sam sighed, exasperated.

"Actually, that is a valid option. I know where we are in the ghost zone, so we're close to the Far Frozen. They'd be happy to help get the rest of the class back." Tucker said.

Sam looked at him, shocked. "How did you know where we are?"

"Easy," Tucker snorted. "They have really this awesome steak-like stuff at the Far Frozen that you can't find in the human realm. I can smell it." Tucker smiled. He sniffed around, and suddenly got a confused look on his face. "I smell something else too. Prime rib.."

Danny snorted. "That's me."

"Meat connoisseur. Meat streak, sixteen years strong and counting!" Tucker thrust his fist in the air theatrically.

"Except for the Blood Blossom incident." Valerie snorted.

"Danny! Why'd you tell her about that?" Tucker complained.

"Don't look at me, dude. That's an embarrassing story for me too, I wouldn't tell her. I mean, who gets taken down by a bunch of flowers?" Danny winced slightly at the memory. Both boys looked at Sam accusingly.

Sam and Valerie giggled.

Johnny cleared his throat awkwardly. "Hey, dudes. I hate to break this up, but we should probably get going."

Danny glared at him. "They're still deciding whether or not they're gonna let me wail you out of existence, so shut up."

"I, for one, want to figure out why they want Danny in the first place. I think we should go with Johnny." Sam said.

"That's a good idea. Besides, who's to say they won't just keep coming after us? We should just find out what they want." Valerie agreed.

"Sure, why not." Tucker concurred.

Danny groaned, his green eyes dulling slightly.

"You gonna behave, Danny?" Sam asked smirking.

Danny looked at her mischieviously. "Maybe."

Sam giggled, and Johnny frowned suspiciously.

Johnny suddenly remembered something, and perked up. He reached into a satchel attached to his bike and pulled out a length of glowing, green rope. He tossed it over to Valerie, who caught it by reflex.

"A gift from the observants?" Danny deadpanned.

"I never got to thank you for that blow to my shadow earlier." He snorted sarcastically at Danny. "Plus, Kitty would be pretty pissed at me if I got severely injured or killed on this trip, sooo.." Johnny caught Valerie's eye and motioned at Danny.

Sam was fuming. "I don't think so Johnny, following you is a leap of trust as it is. We aren't about to make it worse by disabling our biggest asset too." Sam looked thoughtfully at the length of rope for a moment before speaking again. "Besides, that doesn't look strong enough to hold him.

Johnny shrugged. "I was hoping that the fact that we have your classmates would dissuade him from trying." The subtle threat did not go unnoticed by anybody.

Danny would have attacked at that moment, but Sam held him back.

"If we attack Johnny, the observants might hurt the class. Let's just cooperate for now, for their sake. Ok?" Sam reasoned. Her voice was (purposefully) just loud enough for Johnny to hear with his enhanced ghost hearing.

Danny sighed defeatedly while Sam reached over to Valerie and took the glowing rope.

The two girls worked together to trap Danny's arms behind his back. Danny stood still for his friends, but was glaring at Johnny the whole time.

While Johnny was distracted by Danny's death glare, Sam inconspicuously pulled a pocket knife from her boot and slit the rope slightly. Danny, of course, felt the change in the strength of the rope almost immediately and hid a smile.

She leaned in close and whispered to Danny. "Could you break that if you wanted to?"

Danny flexed his wrists a bit, stretching the ghost-proof ropes. He quickly stopped when the he rope almost gave way. He nodded to Sam and looked back over at Johnny, who was oblivious to the exchange between he and Sam. Valerie and Tucker, though, had seen the back-up plan.

When Johnny returned his attention to the four teen's, he looked way more relaxed. Danny withheld a smirk. He instead chose to look back and smile at Sam.

Valerie looked at Johnny with mild irritation. "Satisfied?"

Johnny considered going over to check how well the halfa was restrained, but decided against it. After all, the halfa could turn out to be stronger than the ropes and free to attack Johnny at close range.

With that, Johnny let his motorcycle dissolve and the five began their hike to the Observants' Lair.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Mr. Lancer sighed. He, along with most of his students, were stuck in a bus, being dragged through the Infinite Realms by a large shadow creature. He stood at the front of the bus, trying to calm his students down. Most of the students hadn't stopped screaming since they entered the portal. Others were probably in shock induced silence.

Eventually, he couldn't take the noise anymore. He took out his Fenton phone and put it right in front of his mouth like a microphone. Then he yelled into it as loudly as he could, "For the love of Hamlet, SHUT UP!"

The group leaders winced as Lancers voice came through loud (very loud) and clear through the small radios in their ears. They were silenced, and soon their groups followed their lead.

"Ok." Mr. Lancer spoke with a calming tone, "Everything will be fine. The four students who were outside will find help. They'll send some ghost experts in to retrieve us. Heck, maybe even Phantom will save us." The females all squealed excitedly at this.

Paulina spoke up, "Of course Phantom will save me! We're soul mates! He'll come save me then we'll get married and he'll carry me off into the sunset and-" she was cut off as most of the other students groaned and rolled their eyes.

Dash shivered. "I just hope they don't send the Fenton's. For one, they'll mess up. Secondly, they'll probably bring Danny.." The jock visibly shivered, along with Kwan, Jake and Matt.

"God," Kwan said, "If I ever see him again, it'll be too soon." The three other jocks nodded in agreement.

"So Fenton scares you guys now? What has the world come too?" Paulina mocked.

"We're not scared. He's just.._creepy_. Like, you should have seen his eyes. For like two seconds I thought they were _red_ he was so mad." Jake said.

"You too?" Kwan asked incredulously.

Their conversation broke off when another voice when a growl resounded through the Fenton Phones. It didn't even sound human. Dash still had one of his Fenton Phones out and at top volume, so everyone heard the sound.

"Great Gatsby!" Mr. Lancer looked through the windows of the bus, wondering if the sound had come from outside. When he saw nothing, he was confused. The growl had sounded as if it were right next to him. The students also looked around in confusion.

Then, Dash, of all people, realized, "It came from the radios!"

Mr. Lancer thought about that for a moment, before realizing what was going on. That growl could not have been from the human world. No animal could make such a sound. So whoever was wearing the Fenton Phones that had transmitted the growl must have been inside the ghost zone. The only other people with the radios were..

"_Shit!_" Lancer cursed, surprising the other occupants of the bus. "The other four must have followed us into the ghost zone!"

No one spoke.

Suddenly, a voice broke through the speakers of the Fenton Phones.

"Ok, ok wait-" there was a pause, "Before you try to kill me, just hear me out."

"That sounded like that biker ghost that brought us here.." A jock named Cody commented.

There were a few muffled noises. Suddenly another voice came through.

"Danny, let's _not _use your wail to _completely obliterate _our only chance of finding the class. Even if said 'only chance' is a total jerk."

"That was Valerie! I'd know her voice anywhere" Star cried excitedly, happy to hear her old best friend was ok. Nathan swooned in the background.

"You have two minutes to convince me to not sick Danny on you, _spook._"

"Ok, so here's the deal. I went to Amity Park looking for Phantom, here because Kitty and I had a spaz. I wanted to blow off steam. I found out that you guys were on a field trip and I thought I'd come by and spice up your day. Before I could find you guys, a portal appears out of nowhere right in front of me while I'm driving and I can't brake in time, so I went through it. I ended up some big room with an _observant. _He tells me I gotta go get Phantom for him because they're having some big ghost zone crisis, or some such nonsense. He knew about my spaz with Kitty and he knew I was looking for him. He also you were on a field trip and stuff. He told me to grab all the humans on the trip to make sure he cooperated or whatever. None of this is my idea, or choice, like, at all. No one says no to the Observants. It was totally all his idea, so letting Phantom destroy me would be totally unfair."

Everyone on the bus was silent while letting this sink in. Billions of questions raced through their minds. Phantom was here with Valerie. Were Danny, Sam and Tucker there too? Why would Valerie come in here with Phantom? That was pretty much suicide!

Dash spoke up suddenly. "Did anyone else notice something when Valerie called Johnny 'spook'?"

Mikey gasped. "Your right. She sounded a lot like the Red Huntress didn't she? Maybe that wasn't Valerie at all.. Maybe that was- " He was cut off when a new voice broke through the Fenton Phones. Tucker.

"Why do they want Danny?"

There was static, so Johnny's response was cut off.

When the static died down, Danny was heard. "Are we _seriously _trusting this guy after he kidnapped our _entire class?_"

"We don't really have any other option." Sam said.

The class took in the new revelation. The entire geek squad was here. The Red Huntress might be here, and Phantom might be here. Their last suspicion was confirmed as the next sentence broke through.

"You guys could let me beat Johnny to his second death." The Fenton Phones went back to static. This time, the static remained. They wouldn't overhear anymore of the conversation.

Most of the girls on the bus squealed in delight, despite the ending to their eavesdropping session. The students all spoke to each other excitedly, Phantom was here to save them.

No one even noticing how similar Fenton and Phantom's voices were. Fortunately for Danny, the ghostly echo in Phantom's voice hid the similarity.

The chatter of the students was cut off when the bus jerked forward in the air. The students all felt weightless for a moment before the bus hit the ground on its wheels. The large vehicle rolled for a moment before coming to a stop.

"Is everyone ok?" Mr. Lancer asked.

They were lucky, the only injury was Star. She'd broken her wrist when the fell, but she would be ok. The students all looked outside the bus windows, and were shocked to find themselves in some sort of courtroom. There was a large, green, one eyed ghost floating casually in front of the bus. He was wearing white robes, and had a black cloak. The cloak had old trim and a large collar that made him all the more intimidating. Everyone in the bus was shocked silent. The ghost councilman spoke.

"Greetings, humans. Welcome to the Infinite Realms."


	5. The Infinite Realms pt 2

**Hey guys. Thanks for the reviews and stuff. I love reading them :D **

**This is going to be a really short chapter, and it's sort of an info-dump. You should read it anyways, though, just to find out what's going through the Observant's head.**

**Quick recap of last chapter-** Danny and company are off to the Observants' lair. The class is pretty confused. They overheard a bit of a conversation between Danny, Sam, Val, Tucker and Johnny. They don't know about Danny or Valerie's secrets yet but from what they heard over the Fenton Phones they believe that Phantom and the Red Huntress are both there to help. The Fenton Phones on the bus got out of range and the bus was dropped off by shadow at the Observants' place.

**Soo yea. Enjoy and tell me what you think!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

"Greetings, humans. Welcome to the Infinite Realms." The Observant said.

The door of the bus glowed green for a moment before popping open.

"If you would kindly follow me," The Observant spoke calmly and reassuringly. The humans filed out of the bus, but Lancer stepped up to the front of the group before they walked any further with the ghost.

Mr. Lancer asking, "Why have you brought us here?"

The Observant was silent for a moment, trying to decide what and what not to tell them "I believe you all know a ghost called 'Danny Phantom'?"

Most of the students looked at him incredulously. What did Phantom have to do with this?

When no one else answered the ghost's question, a girl named Emily spoke up. "Yea, we do. He's a ghost that hangs out around Amity Park. He helps people all the time. We kinda look up to him."

The Observant seemed to chuckle at that. "Do you, now? I seem to remember a time where he was an enemy of your town. In fact, I remember multiple times. It seems that no matter how much good he does, one small mistake makes him an enemy again. Am I wrong?"

Mr. Lancer kept his face neutral, even if he was slightly offended at the ghosts words. "They were a bit more than 'small mistakes'. He kidnapped our mayor and stole all sorts of gold and jewels. He even tried to ruin Christmas once. I'd say he's given us enough reason to not fully trust him."

The Observants neutral expression mirrored Lancer's. "The mayor incident was a setup. A rather nasty ghost called Walker arranged the whole thing to destroy Phantoms reputation. When Phantom supposiedly stole all of those jewels he was being ontrolled; by a human I might add. As for the Christmas incident, it was once again another ghost. You all really should give the boy more credit."

"How do you know so much about him?" Dash asked.

"I am a good friend of his mentor, Clockwork. Clockwork often tells me tales of his endeavors in the Human Realm." He cut off there. He looked at the humans, who all looked exhausted and confused.

The Observant considered this, and said, "Why don't we continue this conversation elsewhere? I have a guest room prepared. I can have your bags from the bus delivered there as well."

The humans were too tired and cold to bother being suspicious. They all nodded their consent and followed the Observant out of the courtroom.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

The Observant led the humans through the maze of hallways into the guest rooms. The humans all collapsed onto either a bed or a couch. A few grabbed blankets. Mr. Lancer sat on a couch and the Observant joined him.

"I don't believe we were properly introduced. William Lancer." Mr. Lancer held out his hand.

"I suppose you could call me anything you want, I don't really have a name." The Observant took Mr. Lancer's hand and shook it.

"What do the ghosts call you?" Lancer asked.

The Observant chuckled. "Most ghosts don't single me out. I work on the Observants' Council, and we are normally referred to as a whole. Clockwork, though, got tired of calling me 'Councilman' and often calls me Arthur."

"Good." Mr. Lancer said with a small smile. "I will call you Arthur and you may call me William."

"Agreed. Now, as to why you're all here.." He paused so students had a chance to move over to couches and chairs nearby Mr. Lancer and Arthur.

Now speaking to the whole class, Arthur said, "I truly am sorry for our methods for getting you here. Are any of you injured?"

Paulina called over to Arthur about Star's broken wrist, and he called for a medic. One arrived within minutes and was treating Star as Arthur spoke.

"To start, I must explain the problem in the first place. The entire ghost population is suffering at the hands of an unknown party. Many ghosts have been injured while others are left almost powerless. You remember I mentioned a good friend of mine, Clockwork?" There were nods at this. "He is here, in the hospital wing, along with my fellow councilmen. We are weak, and we are some of the most powerful and influential ghosts in the Ghost Zone. Many weaker ghosts have been destroyed, and others have hidden in their lairs or in the human world. Some, like Johnny 13, do not know anything about the impending threat. That is why he was the perfect candidate for the job I gave him. He was not panicking. He was coolheaded," _mostly,_ Arthur silently added with a smirk, "and therefore was less likely to make a mistake."

"So wait," Dash interrupted, "There is a ghost killing psycho on the loose in the ghost zone while Phantoms out there? We gotta help him!"

Arthur looked slightly confused. "How did you know he was in the Ghost Zone?"

"We heard his sweet, sexy voice over these fashion nightmares in Star's ears." Paulina said while swooning slightly at the thought of th Ghost Boy.

Mr. Lancer pulled one of his radios out of his ears and showed Arthur, who studied the small radio intently.

"Is it still transmitting?" Arthur asked.

"No, the transmission ceased as we approached this place." Mr. Lancer replied.

Arthur returned the earpiece to it's owner. "Anyways," he continued, "We need Phantom to help us because him, being one of the strongest ghosts in the Infinite Realms, may have a chance at defeating whatever is attacking us. You are all here to provide safety for my fellow observants and I. Phantom will arrive here, incredibly angry that I interfered with his cla- humans. He could easily destroy every ghost who was involved with the kidnapping of his humans, but he probably won't try to do so until he has you all back in his protection. You will all have to hide until we can fully explain the situation to him. When Phantom learns of our problem he will willingly stay and help because of his heroic obsession. Then you all will be sent back to the Human World immediately so that none of you are caught in the crossfire."

"Why not just ask him to come? Why not go through all the trouble having us here?" Mikey asked.

"He would not believe me. He is young and incredibly stubborn. He would have had to hear it from Clockwork himself before coming, and Clockwork is in no shape to go on such a journey. Besides, he would not have come immediately because he was.. busy. Now, he will be here very soon.

"Are you confident that he will listen to you?" Mr. Lancer asked.

"If he thinks any of you are in danger he will do anything we ask of him. If that means sitting and listening, that is probably what he will do."

"That doesn't answer my question, Arthur. Are you _confident _that he will choose to listen?" Mr. Lancer pushed.

Arthur sighed. "He will listen, unless he chooses to destroy this place brick by brick until he finds you all. When you use a ghosts obsession against them, you can never be too sure what their reaction will be. Let us cross our fingers that he chooses to be calm."


	6. The Pink Soldiers

**Hey guys, sorry I haven't updated in a while- I had to move so I've been busy. Anyways, last chapter was really short so this one is going to be really long to make up for it. Review! I love hearing what you guys think!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 6 **

**Danny's P.O.V.**

Danny looked over his mental 'Worst Days Ever' list as they trekked through the Ghost Zone towards the Observants' lair. Third worst on his list was the day he fought Pariah Dark, second when he fought his vicious future self, and the worst was when he had to fight Undergrowth. If he told anyone about his list they would call him crazy. He nearly died both the second and the third days on his, and yet they remain second and third. The Undergrowth incident was the worst because it wasn't only him who was left almost dead. His entire town was almost dead, and he'd witnessed it firsthand. He'd seen their life forces being drained by the plants. Even worse, Sam had been used against him. So, that day, he'd nearly been frozen solid, his secret love had threatened his life and the town that he'd sworn to protect had almost lost it's entire population right in front of him and he'd almost been unable to stop it.

_Why can't my list of bad days be normal? Why can't my bad days list be more like, failed test, girlfriend dumping me, not enough money for video games? _Danny thought to himself with dismay.

Today was working its way up his list. About twenty lives were being threatened in an unknown location, and a really annoying ghost was leading him and his best friends through the Ghost Zone. Danny sighed, looking over at Johnny. The ghost looked fairly smug, though a bit on edge. Johnny tended to look over at Danny every few seconds to make sure the halfa wasn't free of the ghost proof restraints. Danny could tell he was on edge.

"Soooo." Tucker said awkwardly, breaking the silence that the group had fallen under. "Any new ghostly gossip, Johnny?"

"For once, no. I actually haven't seen many ghosts around besides Kitty and that Observant." Johnny paused, looking speculative. "It's actually kind of weird, the whole thing with the Observant. You rarely see them alone like that.." Johnny was mumbling.

"Wait-" Danny suddenly stopped walking. Johnny looked back slightly nervous. When he saw the glowing green ropes were still in place around Danny's wrists he calmed down a bit.

"What is it Danny?" Sam approached him, looking concerned.

"Since when do Observants do anything without their fellow councilmen? Well, anything big that is. I'd like to think deciding to kidnap the Ghost Prince is a pretty big move." Danny's brow furrowed. "Actually, Clockwork mentioned one Observant that he meets up with sometimes. Apparently he's the only Councilman that isn't a total ass. I think Clocky called him Andy or something.." Danny trailed off in thought.

"Not relevant." Valerie said, smirking, as she tinkered with an innocent looking bracelet that Danny recognized as an ecto blaster.

Danny chuckled a bit. "Anyways. It must be something pretty important if an Observant is willing to take action on his own."

Sam snorted and said, rather darkly, "It better be something important for causing us so much trouble."

"Danny, go on this ski trip, they said. It'll be fun and relaxing, they said.." Danny mumbled.

Tucker snorted at this, looking over at Johnny. "Well we didn't exactly plan to have the entire class kidnapped to the Ghost Zone."

"Fine, blame me. Even if it totally isn't my fault." Johnny mumbled from the front of the group. "Come on. We have to keep moving. The Observant said to be back by the end of the day."

The group continued walking.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

"It's been _four hours_ since I've had food! _I haven't been without food for that long in my whole life!_ Also would it kill them to have some outlets around here? I can't go on without Shirley any longer!" Tucker had been complaining as if he were Paulina without her daily facial - loudly, annoyingly and incessantly - ever since the group had started walking again. Johnny was actually considering letting the gloomy chick take those ropes of Phantom just so he could shut up his friend. He brightened a moment later when he saw that that would be unnecessary.

"Tucker," Valerie glowered at her boyfriend. "If you do not shut up, I just might decapitate you."

Tucker gulped, shrinking a few inches. Danny and Sam chuckled mumbling 'oh, brother.' simultaneously. They looked at each other for a moment and their eyes met. Both blushed slightly and looked away.

"Dude." Johnny said, slowing slightly so the halfa caught up and was next to him as they walked.

"Yeah?" Danny mumbled, sounding bored.

"Like, no offense man, but your techno geek sidekick is sort of obnoxious."

Sam spoke up, having just caught up with the two ghosts. "Is that supposed to be new, somehow?"

Danny and Johnny snickered, and Tucker yelled from the back of the group, "I heard that!"

Danny suddenly felt a chill run up his spine. A chilled breath of air escaped Danny's mouth. His ghost sense. He knew it wasn't Johnny because his ghost sense had already gone off for the biker ghost. Danny looked around suspiciously, which Sam noticed.

"Oh great," she said sarcastically, "more company."

Danny spotted a few figures in the distance. He squinted. He didn't recognize them.

"Guys," he said with a sense of urgency in his voice, "get behind that boulder over there."

He motioned over at a large rock on the edge of the rock path. His human companions quickly complied, leaving Johnny confused.

"Dude, in case you forgot- you've got ghost-proof ropes on you. If anyones hiding behind some big rock it should probably be you." Johnny said.

To this, Danny snorted. He rolled his shoulders slightly, giving him slight leverage on the ropes. He flicked his wrists and the ropes snapped right where Sam had slitted them. The useless bundle of glowing green restraints fell to the ground. It had taken under five seconds for the halfa to escape. Johnny simply nodded with wide eyes and walked behind the boulder with the humans.

Danny, who was still in his ghost form from earlier, turned invisible. He floated over to the unidentified creatures, silent as a shadow. As he approached, he noticed a few things that were off. For one, they were marching as if they were soldiers. They had so much body armor that if the armor itself wasn't hot pink, the ghosts could have passed for a small army of Skulkers. Even more oddly, their eyes matched their armor. Danny had never seen that color of eyes on any ghost or human. Thirdly, they all carried ecto guns. It was high treason in the Infinite Realms to carry anti-ghost weaponry.

He hid behind a floating rock and turned visible. The bright pink army had just passed the rock so Danny was now watching them float away. He was about to float out from behind his rock to confront them when strong, metallic arms grabbed him from behind. A hand clamped over his mouth to muffle his loud, indignant complaints.

Danny brought up his leg and kicked behind him, and he heard a mumbled curse from his attacker. Taking advantage of the distraction he tried to wrench away, but the grip on him only strengthened. Suddenly the creature holding him back spoke in a hurried whisper.

"Cease your struggling, Whelp. I'm trying to save your life."

Skulker.

Danny quit trying to pull away for a moment in confusion. Skulker hadn't really bothered him in a while. The two were almost frenemies. Feeling the lack of struggling, Skulker let him go.

Danny spun around to face the ghost, angrily saying "What the hell, Skulker?"

"Come, ghost child. We will discuss this elsewhere." Skulker grabbed Danny's wrist and tried to lead him away from the marching ghosts.

Danny paused, "Wait, my humans are on the path down there. I'll go get them-"

"Ember has already found them. Now come on, before _they_ see us." Skulker motioned towards the pink army, and flew off at top speed while towing Danny behind him.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Lancer's P.O.V.**

Lancer allowed himself a small smile at the scene before him.

On the opposite side of the room from himself the cheerleaders were doing each others' hair and gossiping. The jocks of course were listening to the conversation, listening for good blackmail information, most likely. The jocks of course were listening to the conversation, listening for good blackmail information, most likely.

"-and she was all, like, 'Yes way!' and he was all 'No way!'"

"No _way_!"

_"Ahh,_" Mr. Lancer thought to himself happily, _"normalcy."_

He broke out of his thoughts when panicked shouts echoed through the halls. the students in the room looked towards the door with fear in their eyes. Lancer stood up and walked over to the door, pushing it open as slowly and quietly as he could. The shouts were getting closer. Lancer jumped when an Observant floated hurriedly around the corner of the hallway towards the guest room. He couldn't tell if it was Arthur or not.

"Arthur?" Mr. Lancer asked cautiously.

"No, but I know where he is. Grab your things and come, all of you. We are under attack." The Observant Councilman looked anxious.

Dash perked up. "Is it Phantom?"

The Observant mumbled something along the lines of 'if only,' and motioned for the humans to follow him. He led them through a maze of hallways and doors, until they reached what appeared to be an airship hangar. There were several smaller vessels, all obviously equipped with weapons. In the center of the room there was one extremely large ship. The large ship was about as long as a football field and about as tall as a three story building. The Observant ran to the large ship, the humans in tow. The humans all gasped when they boarded the ship.

It looked even bigger on the inside than on the outside. Upon entrance they were in a large room with an assortment of doors and hallways leading around the ship. In the central room there were multiple screens scattered around. The humans were bewildered to find that the screens weren't attached to any form of electric source. On the screens there were the hallways they had just been traversing moments ago, but now in every hallway there were hot pink soldiers storming around with large chrome guns. On the far side of the room, there was a cockpit of sorts; complete with spaceship-like controls and a large window. There were lots of Observants arguing at the helm.

"Now! We have to leave _now!_" One Observant was yelling at another.

"But the engine is weak! Our technicians only need a few more moments and we'll be able to drive to the other end of the Realms if we need to!"

"We won't need to! We are meeting the others the Island. We won't make it there if we don't leave now. _Take off!_" The one yelling this appeared to be the one in charge.

The whole ship vibrated with the whir of the engine as they took off. The door they had just entered through closed behind them. The ship gave one more lurch and through the window the class could see a massive door opening. The Observant at the controls wasted no time in flying them out into the Ghost Zone.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

When Skulker finally stopped and let go of Danny's wrist, the latter collapsed with a groan. He curled in on himself to prevent the nausea from taking over.

"Jeez, Skulker. You need to work on your flying. I'm pretty sure I almost died from motion sickness, and I can fly over two hundred miles per hour… Oh, God. There was also that stupid rock you threw me into..."

"Oh, quit your whining. It couldn't have been that bad."

Danny looked up at him, paler than usual. "Dude, that was the closest you've ever come to killing me and you've been hunting me for two years."

There was unmistakable laughter from a short distance away. He knew immediately who it was, and he smiled. Danny's eyes followed his ears, and he saw Sam, sitting on the ground with the rest of his friends. He only then noticed that his other friends were laughing too.

Tucker stood up, only to fall back down from laughter.

Sam, who had calmed down a bit, rolled her eyes at Tucker. She crawled over to where Danny was curled up, clutching his stomach and moaning.

Sam giggled a bit at the antics of her ghostly friend. "Are you actually ok? Or are you doing that stupid thing that you do where you cover up your pain and injuries with jokes-" She was cut off by Danny.

"What? I don't do that!" He protested.

Tucker was still chuckling, but he managed to make his way over, along with Valerie.

"Dude," Tucker said between laughs. " 'He who covers up his pain with jokes' could the name of your biography."

Though he knew his friends were joking, Danny sighed, turning around so his back was facing his friends. They all gasped at the sight. His suit was torn, and right under the tear, Danny was cut. The gash made its way from his right shoulder to just below his right shoulder blade. What the cut lacked in length it made up for in depth, it was bleeding quite a bit. Danny's jumpsuit was absorbing the majority of the ectoplasm/blood.

"Is it that bad?" Danny said, wincing at their reaction. "Skulker only told me, 'That's the least of your problems, Ghost Child.'" His imitation of Skulker's deep voice would have made them laugh if it weren't for all the blood soaking his suit.

"Danny how did this happen?" Sam asked sternly. Valerie fumbled with her cell phone, trying to take a picture to show Danny.

"Well, we were going along at top speed. Suddenly Skulker made a sharp right, and I got whipped into a floating rock." Danny said nonchalantly.

Valerie could only gape as Danny blew off this injury. Though she'd known of his alter-ego for a bit more than a month, she'd never really understood the full extent of the injuries Danny received while ghost-fighting. She was even more shocked when Sam whacked Danny upside the head for not being serious about his injuries.

Seeing her shocked face, Tucker kissed her on the cheek reassuringly and said, "Don't worry, Babe. This is normal for them." Tucker chuckled.

Valerie snapped herself out of the slight stupor she'd been in and took a picture of Danny's back with her phone. She handed the picture to Danny. Out of any way he could have reacted, she'd expected this the least. He seemed almost pleasantly surprised.

"Oh," He said, examining the picture with a slight grin, "I thought it would be worse. That's not that bad, though."

"Yea, Danny." Sam said sarcastically. "It'll only need stitches. Not that bad."

To this Danny shrugged, although he winced slightly at the movement. "It's not like I haven't been stitched up before. You always do a great job."

The last part of his statement shocked Valerie. "Wait, you've done _stitches _before?"

Sam smirked. "You'd be surprised at what one could learn to do over the internet."

"Whelp and sidekicks of Whelp, we have to get moving." Skulker said, approaching them.

Danny only then took in his surroundings, he hadn't even bothered to look before. They appeared to be on Skulkers Island. He noticed Ember not far away. She was fidgeting with her studded belt and looking around nervously.

Danny and company stood, Tucker helping Danny out when a wave of dizziness claimed him. Sam looked at her halfa friend and approached Skulker.

"We need medical supplies, like, soon." She said.

"We have supplies where we are going." He looked up into the skies nervously. "Now we have to get moving. Go help your tech friend carry the Whelp."

She quickly ran over to where Tucker and Valerie were struggling to keep Danny conscious. In the end, the three uninjured teens took turns carrying Danny piggyback, which was surprisingly easy. He was lighter than a normal human.

The small group traveled for about half an hour, before coming up to the large skull shaped rock on the island. They walking in through the teeth, and were greeted by what must have been a hundred ghosts in Skulkers surprisingly huge living room. Murmurs arose through the crowd of ghouls. The Ghost prince appeared to be injured. Had _they _attacked him? Skulker and Ember parted the crowd and kicked a couple of ghosts off a couch. Tucker, who'd been carrying Danny last, put his now unconscious friend on the couch face down so they could treat his wound. Sam moved his face so he could breathe. Now in human form, Danny was much more vulnerable and his friends had to be even more careful about his treatment.

A random ghost that none of Danny's friends recognized floated over to them with a case of medical equipment. As soon as the case was open, Sam was readying the needle. Tucker set to cleaning the wound and Valerie prepared the bandages.

When Sam was one fixing up the needle, she reached over to Danny and pulled his red and white t-shirt off. There were scars scattered all over his chest, big and small. Valerie stopped what she was doing at the sight. Many ghosts were shocked silent and were teary eyed. Not child should ever have this many scars. The boy wasn't even two decades old and he had more scars than half the population of the room put together. Valerie though, was especially crushed, knowing she could have caused a few of these herself.

She looked up at Tucker, who was looking at her sympathetically. He knew what she was wondering. "He didn't blame you. Not ever."

That confirmed it for Valerie. She'd caused a scar. Maybe even more than one. Valerie teared up at the thought. Tucker pulled her into a hug. After a few moments she broke away, tears falling.

"Which ones?" She asked Sam, knowing Tucker wouldn't be totally honest if it would hurt her. She wanted to know the full truth.

Sam looked from Valerie to Danny. She sighed. "There are one or two small ones of his chest. One on his leg. and this one here-" Sam ran her finger along a long scar that ran from one side of his waist to just below his ribs on the other side.

Valerie let out a sob. Tucker pulled her back into his arms. Suddenly, a low sigh was heard right in front of them on the couch.

"I take it you guys were admiring my trophies." Danny said in all seriousness.

Valerie raised an eyebrow.

"I decided awhile ago that scars are a bit disheartening. So, instead, I call them trophies. They're kind of the trophies I get for beating death." Danny chuckled. "I also call them trophies because the people who gave them to me, whether or not they meant to, boosted my confidence; kind of like what trophies do. They encourage you to keep going. If I'd been scared of getting injured and dying all the time when I first started ghost hunting, I wouldn't be where I am today. I wouldn't have taken on Pariah Dark. Frankly, I was such a wimp back when I got my ghost half I'm not even confident I would have taken on the box ghost." Danny's chuckled morphed into a smirk. "The point is, every single mark I got made me more confident I could survive. It made me confident enough for me take the stupidly impossible risks that save lives. So, yea, looking at my scars does bug me a bit, but it also saves lives. That has to count for something, doesn't it?"

Valerie looked confused. Danny sat up on the couch with a wince, despite Sam's protests. He searched his bare chest for a moment before he found the scar he was looking for. He smiled at Valerie. He pointed at a short, thin scar right over his ribcage.

"You remember the first time you were ever in the Ghost Zone? It was right here on Skulkers Island. We were chasing after a flour sack with a smily face on it." Both he and Valerie smiled at the memory. "When I got hit with the dart and I was paralyzed, you had to drag us both away from Skulker and I got this from a rock." He paused looking speculative. "The rocks here in the ghost zone must really hate me, huh?" He chuckled and Sam smacked his leg, telling him to get to the point. "Anyways, so a couple months later, Amity Park is dragged into the Ghost Zone. I was terrified. I was in my bedroom, I looked at that scar and said 'Well, if I can survive sharp evil ghost rocks, I can survive this." He ended with a goofy smile.

All his friends and a few ghost listening in broke out laughing.

"You liar, Danny." Valerie said, still feeling bad, but Danny had managed to cheer her up a bit.

"Yea, your right. I'm pretty sure I have used this scar though. Not to convince myself to go fight Pariah. Probably to convince myself that if I didn't go save some poor souls' boxes from the Box Ghost that Karma would give me another one of these little guys to spite me."

This earned a few more laughs from his friends and the surrounding ghosts.

"But seriously, Valerie, I never blamed you. You couldn't have known. With all that junk my parents always spout about 'Ghosts don't feel pain' and stuff, I would have probably acted the same way as you." He said softly.

Valerie smiled. She walked over to Danny and gave him a hug. For a few moments nothing happened. Then Danny hissed in pain.

"Oh God, I forgot. Sorry Danny!" Valerie said, looking upset again.

Danny laughed. "It's fine, Valerie. Ok, Sam, you ready to get this stitched up?"

Sam moved over a bit so Valerie could walk back over to Tucker.

Then she smiled at Danny, saying "Ready when you are."

Danny lay back down on the couch so Sam could do her work. Danny braced himself for the discomfort when, before Sam could do anything, Skulkers Island began to shake.


	7. Skull Rock

**Hey guys! **

**This chapter is a bit different than the others. We see Sam's point of view, and turns out she's got a ton of bottled up angst. Review and tell me what you think of it!**

_**Author's random notes and stuff that you should probably read**_**: **

**-I'm starting up another story- (see my profile for details) but I'm still gonna keep going with this one too. I'll try not to, but if I start getting slow with this one, just send me an angry PM and I'll speed up the updates here!**

**-Congratulations KageOfNights! You're my 50th story favourite! :D That's pretty awesome considering this is my first story. Thanks so much for the continued support guys! **

**-**_**HUGE thanks to everyone who reviewed!**_ **Hearing what you guys think really helps!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 7**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

The ride in the enormous vessel had been short, and soon they found themselves landing on an oddly shaped, floating island. The engine was cut off and the Observants sent a few scouts ahead to make sure it was safe. The students and Mr. Lancer were all helping unload the ship. The Observants had brought plenty of supplies.

The class had just finished and were sitting outside the vessel (others were standing to 'not be dirty when the ghost boy arrived to save her because they're soul mates *cough* Paulina *cough again*), when Arthur limped out of the vessel. They hadn't seen him in a while, not since he'd last spoken to them.

"Arthur?" Mr. Lancer asked just in case.

"Yes, it's me." He replied. The Observant sounded exhausted.

"Are you ok, dude? You sound like shit." Matt asked. Emily elbowed him.

The Observant chuckled good-naturedly. "I suppose I do. Don't fret; I'll live." He paused for a moment in contemplation. "In the loosest sense of the word, of course." The Observant didn't have a mouth, but if he had, he probably would have been grinning.

A chuckle was heard from the vessel. "I always admired your ability to make jokes in a crisis, Arthur." A ghost floated out of the boat. He had blue skin and red eyes, and a scar running across his left eye. He wore a purple cloak with a black gear holding it in place. There was a grandfather clock in the ghost's chest. Before their eyes, he morphed from a middle aged man to an elderly man within seconds.

"Ah, Clockwork. How are you feeling?" Arthur asked.

Mr. Lancer remembered this Clockwork ghost, Arthur had mentioned him. He was supposedly Danny Phantom's Guardian/Mentor.

Lancer chuckled when he realized he wasn't the only one who remembered what Arthur had said.

"DUDE! You're that guy that knows Danny Phantom!"

"Is he ok?"

"How often does he talk about me? I'm Paulina! He and I are soulmates!"

Several students were pestering the ghost, when suddenly there was a shout-

"Silence!" Arthur yelled angrily.

The teenagers were silent then, and Mr. Lancer stepped forward.

"I apologize for the behavior of my students, Clockwork. They just wanted to learn a bit more about their hero." Lancer said calmly.

Clockwork chuckled. "If they can stand to wait about ten minutes they can ask him these questions themselves. I do believe we were about to leave to go meet him and a few other surviving ghosts." He changed from an elder to an infant, once again surprising the humans.

The students recovered from the surprise of the ghosts transformation and all cheered up at the news he brought them. They were going to meet Phantom. Every student, even Paulina, grabbed some supplies to carry if it meant they could leave faster.

As soon as the scouts returned, the head Observant used some kind of ghost energy to shrink the vessel. When he was done, it was small enough to fit in someone's pocket. The humans could only gawk. The head observant looked tired from using so much energy, but he was satisfied. Had he not been strong enough to make that spell work, anyone looking for them would have seen the ship. Thankfully, that was no longer an issue.

The group found a path that seeed to lead towards the center of the island, where a large, skull shaped rock stood above the trees. They began following the path.

The group had been only been walking for five minutes, maybe less, when they were ambushed.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Sam's P.O.V.**

(About half an hour earlier)

Sam choked down her tears for the umpteenth time that day. Ever since Danny had showed them his injury, she'd been feeling awful. She hated when Danny got hurt. She knew that it wasn't always her fault that Danny got hurt, but in the back of her mind, there was always that voice that sneered and asked her, 'Would that had happened if you didn't send Danny into the portal in the first place?'

She'd decided long ago that she was going to help him through it no matter what, and that she was not going to burden him with her guilt. She had her own version of Danny's covering pain with jokes. She covered her sadness with her gothic sass and sarcasm. She would smack him for not being more serious about his injuries. She would stitch him up and not cry. She would help him comfort Valerie, because if it weren't for her creating Phantom, the huntress wouldn't have been put through so much pain either.

She would not cry in front of Danny. She wouldn't do that to him.

Now, Danny was asking her with a smile if she was ready. She would smile back through her pain and tell him she was ready when he was. She looked back at Tucker. She could see the sympathy in his eyes. He knew what she was thinking.

~Flashback~

About three months earlier, at about 2:30 am, Sam woke to tapping on her window. She got up and rushed to the window, and there was Danny, leaning heavily on the window sill. He was paler than normal. She motioned for him to come on in, and he fell through the glass intangibly. When he landed on his side, he winced. He made a stupid joke about dropping in. Having had almost two years of experience, she knew what that meant. She ran to grab her first aid kit from underneath her bed. Danny had pulled himself onto one of the couches in Sams room. He lay flat on his face, moaning slightly from the pain. Then Sam noticed the blood covering this torso.

"Danny. _Danny._ Keep your eyes open. Look at me Danny, just keep looking at me." Sam instructed as the cut the top part of his jumpsuit off, revealing what looked like a wound from some kind of knife. She jumped slightly when blinding rings of light appeared around Danny's waist, signaling the return of his human form, and his unconsciousness. She got to work quickly, knowing that his healing slowed in his human form. She quickly cleaned the wound, choking back the nausea she felt. She bandaged it up as well as she could, but it kept bleeding heavily. She choked up, knowing what she had to do. She returned to the medical kit and prepared the needle, threading it quickly, and getting to work. That was the first time she'd ever stitched one of Danny's wounds. What she was feeling as the needle passed through Danny's flesh was confusing. It was a mixture of fear that she would make a mistake, and disgust that Danny had been this injured and she hadn't been at the scene helping him with whatever attacked him. She moved quickly, doing the best job she could of keeping the stitches even and precise, despite her shaking.

The second she tied off the thread, she ran into the bathroom that was attached to her room and threw up into the tub. When her nerves calmed slightly, she went back to Danny, and finished dressing the wound. She then put a blanket around him and watched him, making sure he was ok. Just looking at him like this made her tear up. She called Tucker, who thankfully picked up his phone. She tried to tell him what happened, but before she could tell him anything she broke into sobs. Tucker, who was at home in his bed, listened to his best friend cry. She'd been crying into the receiver for about ten minutes before she could tell him that she'd had to give Danny stitches. He rushed over to comfort his friend.

Since that night, Sam had not cried once. She decided that she would not cry again until the day Danny died because she had to be there for him. She would stay strong for him.

~End Flashback~

Sam was just about to start tending Danny's wound when the island started to shake. She quickly pulled the needle away so she wouldn't accidently stick him. He looked up at Skulker, who had pushed his way through the crowd, in confusion.

"What's going on Skulker?" He asked from the couch.

"A large vehicle has just landed. It is either _them,_ or more ghosts seeking refuge." Skulker's expression was blank. "Either way, we don't have time for these human methods of healing. We must go find out who it is, and if they're a threat, eliminate them." He pulled a vial from his belt and tossed it to Sam. The vial contained a glowing blue liquid.

"What in the hell is this, metal head?" She asked.

Skulker bristled, but was patient with the girl. "It'll heal him faster than human treatments will. Now hurry up and pour a drop on the Ghost Prince's wound so he can go deal with who or what just landed in my backyard."

Sam looked at Danny, who was looking at the vial with curiosity.

"Isn't that..?" Danny began, before trailing off.

"It is. Plasmius would be wise to upgrade his security."

Danny laughed at that. He knew about Skulker and Plasmius' quarrel. He'd seen it firsthand when the two had nearly destroyed the park before he'd arrived. Danny nodded to Sam, who poured a drop over his wound. To Sam's relief, the drop seeped into Danny's wound, healing it almost instantly. She was even more relieved when she realized that she wouldn't have to stitch up her secret love anymore.

Danny waited for a moment, and suddenly felt a rush of energy. He flew up off of the couch, doing a somersault in the air before landing gracefully on his feet.

Danny stretched his muscles a bit, before whistling in admiration. "Wow. Vlad wasn't kidding when he said this stuff was a miracle worker. Maybe I should listen to his ranting more often." Sam offered him the vial without a comment, and he took it.

Sam grinned with relief, while Tucker and Valerie just smiled. They were all exceptionally pleased that their friend was feeling better.

Danny cracked his knuckles and said with a slightly malicious grin, "So, what's this about someone new on the island?"

"Oh my _God,_" A new voice sneared, "You aren't seriously going out looking like that, are you?"

Danny turned to see Kitty and Johnny walk into the room. It had been Kitty who'd spoken.

"Where have you been?" Danny asked Johnny.

"I had to find Kitty. When Ember told me about the big threat or whatever I left to get her."

Tucker finally spoke up, after having been uncharacteristically silent since they got to Skulker's place. "The Infinite Realms are facing total annihilation and you're seriously worried about Danny's wardrobe?" He asked Kitty incredulously.

Danny looked at himself before laughing. "Her concern is justified. I'm scarier than Skulker right now." His friends laughed with their friend. The Halfa was covered in a mixture of blood, ectoplasm, leaves and dirt. He looked like he'd been to hell and back.

Sam perked up. "Good thing I brought extra clothes, then, isn't it?"

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Danny, Skulker, and a few other ghosts prowled through the bushes. They were searching the island, but they hadn't seen any sign of the vessel or its inhabitants.

Danny sighed and asked Skulker if he was sure someone had landed here.

Skulker snorted, "What else could have caused that quake from earlier?"

"Maybe they left?" A random ghost pointed out.

"Highly unlikely. That would have caused another quake." Another said.

The ghosts continued their conversation while they followed Danny. He toned them out and listened to the forest around them. He used his enhanced hearing so that he could hear if a twig snapped a half a mile away. Suddenly, he heard something. A voice.

Danny held up a fist, an action telling them to stop. The ghosts all froze, their conversation ceasing. Danny strained his ears until he could clearly hear the voices.

"Why are we not walking, Whelp?" Skulker asked loudly.

Danny winced, motioning for him to quiet down. "I hear voices; probably our visitors..." He said.

Skulker brightened. "It must be just ghosts seeking refuge then. The pink soldiers don't speak. They just attack."

The voices were getting louder. More and more footsteps came within earshot.

Danny whispered to Skulker. "Its a big group. There are twenty to thirty walking, and probably more floating."

He paused, reaching out with his senses. He could feel movement in the ectoplasmic currents of the Ghost Zone skies. He learned this as he spent more and more time in his future kingdom. He followed the movements, estimating how many ghosts were floating.

"About fifty floating." Danny said.

He looked back at the small army of ghosts he had with him. Skulker had picked them himself; they were all trained and ready to fight.

"Ok, guys. So heres what we're going to do. Scree," Danny picked one of the ghosts that he trusted. "You take a team of five out there to greet them, the rest of us will scatter around in the bushes and cover you guys. If they don't try to attack, great. You guys lead them back to the skull and we'll cover your backs. If they don't come the easy way, the rest of us will step in."

The ghosts all scattered. Scree picked five of his friends and they all sat in the bushes, waiting for the right moment to come out. When the group was close enough, five ghosts, including Scree, stepped out of the treeline. Danny's Ghost sense went off when the group they were ambushing were in range.

There were a few girly screams in the crowd. When Danny got a good look at the group, he saw that the majority of the crowd was made up of the Observants. Danny was fuming from his spot in the bushes. He wanted to go give them a piece of his mind and find out where his humans were, but he knew that he should wait. Wait and see their reactions to Scree and his group of merry men, over there.

He had to give the five ghosts credit. With the slight fog and their dark armor, the group looked terrifying. He heard a few whimpers in the crowd, and turned confused. Then he saw them.

His humans.

Skulker, who was crouching next to him in the bushes, whispered "Are those not your humans, there?"

"Yes. Yes they are my humans." Danny said this with a deadly calm before he stepped out of his hiding place. Everyone's eyes whipped towards him.

"Ok." He said to Scree and his group, "New Plan."

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

When Danny Fenton emerged from the foggy trees, the humans were shocked. What was Fenton doing there? Where was the rest of the geek squad? Where were the Huntress and Phantom?

When he blew off the terrifying ghosts that blocked their path, their eyes bugged out of their heads.

The class (and Mr. Lancer) took a good look at Fenton.

He had changed. Gone were the ratty jeans and t-shirt they all recognized. This new Danny wore a pitch black muscle shirt and cargo pants. The cargo pants were also black with white zippers. Danny had a chain around his neck with a stainless steel DP insignia and a few spiked bracelets covered his wrists.

When he looked at the Observants with a glare. The Observants were nervous; fully aware that in their weakened state there was no guarantee that they could defend themselves against the enraged were mixed emotions from the humans. The jocks who hadn't felt Danny's wrath earlier were shocked. Fen-turd actually looked kind of scary with the dark look and glare thing he had going on. For Matt, Jake, Dash and Kwan, the glare chilled them to the bone, even if it wasn't directly at them. They felt sorry for the Observants. Most of the girls were only thinking about how hot Danny looked without the baggy clothes. None of the humans failed to notice that Danny wasn't as scrawny as they'd originally thought. The shirt he had on now showed off well toned muscles.

As Danny told the first five ghosts 'New Plan', many more ghosts emerged from the trees; including the mechanical ghost, Skulker, who the humans recognized from Amity.

All of the ghosts gathered behind Danny, and when he spoke, there was silence.

"The High Council of Observants. A pleasure to see you. I hope you've come to return the humans; if not, we're just going to have to take them."

Arthur stepped forward, speaking in a language the humans did not understand. "_**Your majesty, please listen to reason. We needed them because we need you. We were never going to hurt them. That is against our laws."**_

Danny spoke back to him in the same language. He sounded angry. "_**You could have **_**asked. **_**If the Ghost Zone is in this much trouble I would have come on my own. You didn't have to send Johnny to kidnap me." **_Danny smirked."_**That ghost proof rope sucked by the way. I broke out in like, three seconds**_**.**"

Arthur looked nervous. "_**All due respect Prince Daniel-"**_

"_**Danny."**_

Arthur corrected himself. "_**All due respect, Danny, would you have come as quickly as you did if we'd just asked you to come? This problem is occurring right now, after your vacation it might have been too late. Besides- you wouldn't have believed me. You would have thought it was a trick of some sort. Clockwork himself would have had to tell you, and he was in no condition to make such a journey-"**_

"_**I assure you, Prince Phantom," **_The head Observant interrupted. "_**This councilman acted without our consent. Most of us were in the hospital wing the entire time, tending to our wounded. We would have stopped him if we knew.."**_

Danny cut him off. "_**Where is Clockwork?"**_

Clockwork pushed through the crowd of Observants, whacking a few with his time staff as he went. "_**I am here, Daniel. Trust me, Arthur is telling the truth. Frankly, I respect him for acting without the council. They wouldn't have wanted to pull such a big move, but I assure you, it was necessary. You need to be here right now, not on vacation."**_

Danny huffed, speaking in English now. "A little warning might have been nice."

"I would have warned you, if I hadn't been in a coma in the medical wing of the Observants Tower." Clockwork said with a sigh. The old ghost wavered in the air.

Danny paled. "Was it..?"

"No, Daniel. It was not him. He is still in the thermos, hidden in the wall of my lair. I turned the thermos intangible and put it through the wall before I was attacked by those pink soldiers."

"Are you ok now?"

"I'm fine;" Clockworks voice was strained, and Danny raised an eyebrow. Clockwork sighed. "We can talk about me later, but right now we must keep moving. Where are the others?"

"The skull rock. I was planning on having Scree and his boys take you all down there, until I saw them." Danny motioned towards the humans, who all looked bewildered.

"I see. Shall we be going?" Clockwork turned around to the Observants. Arthur looked pleased with himself, and the others looked passive.

"Sounds good." Danny, after mumbling a few words to Skulker, motioned for the group of ghosts behind him to move ahead, which they did without question.

Then Danny grabbed Clockwork by the wrist and pulled the old ghost onto his back.

Clockwork was annoyed by this. "I can float perfectly well on my own, you know."

"You told me you just got out of a ghost coma and you sound exhausted. I'm doing you a favor. Just roll with it, Clockwork."

Clockwork smirked, but let his mentee carry him.

The humans, meanwhile, were so shocked that they could barely move. Fenton had just ordered around a huge group of ghosts and they hadn't even questioned him. Maybe it had something to do with the red eyes earlier? What about that ectoblast that he'd fired from his hand during the fight with Johnny? Was that like, a secret ecto gun in his hand or was a ghost overshadowing him? What was that language he'd spoken to the Ghosts earlier?

Lancer had read an ungodly amount of mystery novels in his time, and almost every time he'd known what was going on before the main characters in the book had. Danny Fenton, though, was such a mystery that Lancer didn't even have a _guess _as to what was going on. He had a feeling that the answer was right in front of all of their faces, yet it was so unlikely that no one was even crazy enough to consider it. The thought frustrated Lancer to an unimaginable extent.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Danny was leading the group back to the skull rock. He'd sent Skulker and the others took a shortcut to make sure nothing back at the skull attracted any suspicion from the humans about the secret identity of their prince.

Danny adjusted his hold on Clockwork so he could use one of his hands to motion forward the councilman that had acted alone. He still couldn't remember his name.

"What did Clockwork tell me your name was when I wasn't paying attention?" Danny asked, smirking, as the councilman approached him. Clockwork lightly hit Danny's head with his time staff, making Danny chuckle.

"Arthur."

"Cool. I was close- I thought it was like, Alex or Andy or something. Anyways, so, about what happened.." Danny said a bit awkwardly.

"I understand if you're angry with me, Prin-... Danny," Arthur looked back at the humans, who were looking at him with suspicion in their eyes. They didn't seem to hear his slip up.

"I was a bit mad at first, but after you explained your actions, I understand. I don't really blame you, now. In fact, I respect you for your decision to act on your own."

"Thank you, your highness." Arthur said, so pleased that he had Danny's approval that he forgot the Ghost Prince had a secret to keep.

"WHAT?" A human voice shrieked from behind them.


	8. Ferone

_**VERY IMPORTANT- PLEASE READ**_

**I can't decide which of my two story ideas to follow. So, I've decided to get you guys to choose!**

**Story Idea 1- Person from our universe thrown into the DP universe. Person is not a halfa, but that doesn't mean she isn't going to be awesome! Story will be funny and interesting. I already have the first chapter done for this idea so if you guys want this one it'll be up faster than Idea 2. If you guys like my first fic (this one) then I'm pretty sure you'll like that one. :)**

**Story Idea 2- This one is a challenge from ****t-rex989****. Lancer's English class is sent back to Ancient Rome and are having some ...difficulties… with the locals. This one will be a more dramatic/intense fic so if thats what you're into then vote idea two!**

**You can either send your vote in a PM or a review- either way works for me.**

**I love the reviews I got for my last chapter too, so thanks! Keep letting me know what you all think of this story!**

**Chapter 8**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

"_Thank you, your highness." Arthur said, so pleased that he had Danny's approval that he forgot the Ghost Prince had a secret to keep. _

"_WHAT?" A human voice shrieked from behind them._

Danny froze, going deathly pale. The frost was back, covering his fingers and hair. he quickly shook out his hair before anyone noticed. Every other ghost there froze as well, the Observants, the ghosts who worked for the Observants, all of them. They all knew the importance of their Prince's secret identity. Were it to get out, he would be hunted in his home world. He would be shunned. Phantom didn't deserve that for all the good he did.

Danny turned slowly, and saw _Dash._ The jock was standing right behind him.

"Shit." Was all Danny could muster through his shock.

"You're a _king?!"_ The jock asked incredulously.

"No. He's a Prince." Clockwork said with a snarkily.

Danny hissed at his guardian over his shoulder, "_Not. Helping."_

"Dash..? Did you just say that Fenon is a _king?_" Paulina asked, her face paling tremendously.

"He's not a king. He's a Prince." Dash said matter-of-factly.

"_WHAT?!_" was the response from the entire class.

"Prince of what? This spooky island?" Kwan asked.

"Guys- Clockwork was just messing with you. I'm not the prince of anything."

"Oh, Daniel, stop being modest. They would never bug you again if they knew you were...-" Clockwork was cut off. The old ghost suddenly went entirely still. After mere seconds he went limp and passed out, falling off Danny's back.

Danny was by his mentors side in less than a second.

Danny's brow furrowed. He could feel the time ghost's core was still active, telling him that Clockwork wasn't gone. He was simply unconscious.

"What the hell?" Danny muttered, and looked up to see Arthur collapsing to the ground as well. Danny watched in mute horror while the other ghosts around him met the same fate. He looked over at the class, who were thankfully still conscious. He was about to release a sigh of relief that he wasn't the only one awake when he noticed their expressions. They were looking over Danny's shoulder, with a look that was both confused and terrified at the same time.

"Hello, _your majesty._" A voice sneered from behind him. Danny only had half of a second to consider how familiar the voice was.

Danny was about to turn around to face the owner of the voice when suddenly he felt something hard hit the back of his head.

After only a moment of pain, the halfa blacked out.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Tucker's P.O.V.**

When Skulker rushed into the Skull Rock, he began barking out orders immediately.

"Burn the Princes old clothes, the ectoplasm would be suspicious. Get rid of the medical supplies, get rid of that bloody couch, get rid of anything that might attract suspicion from his highnesses humans."

"Skulker. We're right here." Valerie said, confused.

"No. His _other _ones. The Observants are here, they explained everything, they brought the humans, the High Prince is bringing them here, soon, so everyone had better be prepared for their arrival! Get moving!" Skulker yelled at a mile a minute.

Tucker, Sam and Valerie ran around, clearing away anything that might cause suspicion from the class. They helped ghosts clear blood/ectoplasm stains from the floor and carpet area and from off the couch. They also threw out all the old bandages that Danny had used.

When everything was clean of evidence, the three friends sighed in relief. The class was probably suspicious enough as it was. If they found anything pointing towards Danny's secret, the results could have been catastrophic.

They plopped down on a couch and waited for the arrival of their friend and class.

They waited for a long time.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

When Danny came to, he had one of the worst headaches of his life. The Prince groaned, opening his eyes, and tried to sit up. He immediately realised three things. One, he was in a dark room, and judging the bumps and whirs Danny felt outside the room, he was in a vehicle of some sort. Two, his class was nowhere to be seen. Three, this was the second time _that day_ that he'd been caught off guard, and captured because of it.

He tried to remember what had happened. He'd been on Skulker's Island, leading everyone back to the hunter's lair.

Clockwork passed out. All the other ghosts did too. The pain blossoming at the back of his skull.

'Hello, _your majesty._' He remembered a voice had said.

He recognized that voice.

He strained to remember who it was, but he couldn't place it.

Danny stood up and felt around the walls of the room, smirking at the failed attempt at ghost-proofing it.

Danny knew about this sort of thing from experience. When Danny was first made a ghost, his core was weak. So, when Vlad trapped him in a room that had been ghost proofed, it felt like a cork on a bottle of his ghost powers. As his core grew stronger, he was able to get past the cork more and more often. Two years later, his core was one of the strongest in the Ghost Zone. Now, the cork was almost nonexistent, meaning that most ghost proof things didn't even hinder him anymore. That was why he'd been able to break Johnny's ropes earlier. The only exception to the ghost proofing rule was 'Ectoranium'; Vald had mentioned the material in one of his rants. Apparently that particular substance was naturally ghost resistant; not man made like most ghost proof objects. It wasn't a matter of cores with naturally ghost proof material, it was simply a matter of ectoplasmic entity vs. not ectoplasmic entity.

Danny shook himself, knowing that his friends would be reminding him to stay focused if they were there.

He reached out with his core, just like he had when he was seeing if Clockwork was ok.

He still felt his own cold, ghostly aura; which meant that the wall wasn't strong enough. His attackers had underestimated him.

Danny phased out of the room and turned invisible.

After doing a bit of looking around, Danny figured that the vessel he was in was pretty much an super-sized Specter Speeder. It was used for travel through the Ghost Zone.

This brightened Danny's mood. As long as he was still in the Infinite Realms he could easily find Skulkers again. Before he left, though, he was going to find the person (or people) responsible for this inconvenience. Danny phased through another wall, and found himself in what appeared to be the control room of the speeder. There were four people in there. Two seats in the front, two in the back. They were all dressed in bright, hot pink, battle armor.

Danny's jaw dropped when he recognized one of them through the face visor he wore. Other than the pink irises, the man was he and Tucker's math teacher, Mr. Ferone. Danny was confused. He and Tuck both agreed that Mr. Ferone was their best teacher because, for one, he was younger (maybe his late twenties) so he wasn't as harsh and weird as most teachers. Secondly, he more fun in class. He made things as interesting as he could and cared about his students more than the other teachers did. He was a really nice guy. There was no way he'd attacked Danny out of his own free will.

With a renewed sense of urgency, Danny flew into Mr. Ferone's body without overshadowing him, simply listening to his thoughts.

What he found in his math teacher's head, he was not expecting. There was a voice, barking out commands to, whom Danny assumed, were other peoples minds as well as Mr. Ferone's.

"C-13, anything to report from the realm of the Far Frozen?" The voice sounded through Mr. Ferone's mind.

"No locals have been found. There is evidence of civilization, but it seems they have evacuated." An unrecognizable voice answered.

"Keep looking."

The voice went on to yell at more people using numbers instead of names. He must be the leader; the one who had put this spell on all these humans.

He thought back to Clockwork's lessons about the mind-control of humans. That would explain how they were all communicating with their minds. It would also explain the bright pink eyes- victims of mind control normally inherited the eye color of the leader.

Danny brightened when he remembered how to break the spell.

_Thank youuuu, Clockwork._ Danny thought with a grin.

Danny concentrated on making his voice only heard to Mr. Ferone, blocking out the other mind-control victims and the leader.

"James Ferone." He said in his teacher's mind.

Danny quickly fully overshadowed his math-teacher so the extremely confused man wouldn't give away the fact that he was free of the leader's power. Danny kept his posture straight and his teachers' face passive.

Mr. Ferone's voice echoed in Danny's mind. "What the heck..?"

"Heyyy, Mr. Ferone. What's up?" Danny replied awkwardly.

"Fenton?"

"Yea, it's a long story, and we really don't have much time. Now, do you remember what happened?"

The young math teacher mentally winced.

"I still have all of the memories. That ghost took over. I was still there, but it was different. I was sort of watching his drone from the back of my mind, unable to do anything… Sorry about knocking you out with that rock, by the way."

Danny burst out laughing, in his mind of course. "You got me with a _rock?_ Why am I not surprised? I _told _them the rocks here hate me! " He paused, sensing confusion from Mr. Ferone. "Another long story. First, lets get out of here. Do you know any of the other three people in here?"

"The woman sitting in front of us is my wife."

"Her full name?"

"Anna Ferone."

"Ok, now listen carefully. Stay absolutely still when I give you the controls back. Keep a straight face no matter what. Got it?"

Not waiting for an answer, Danny phased out of Mr. Ferone and into the woman, Anna, in front of him. He once again heard the leader asking for status reports and telling everyone what to do.

He cut them out of Anna's head and spoke clearly. "Anna Ferone."

He overshadowed her a half a second later.

He heard her groan inside her mind.

"Ms. Ferone?" Danny asked calmly.

"...who are you and why are you in my head?"

"I'm Danny. I'll explain more later." He repeated the instructions to her that he'd given Mr. Ferone before he left the math teachers body. He phased out of Anna and went over to one of the other drones. One of them was driving the speeder, so to avoid a collision with floating ghost debris he chose the other one first.

He phased into the man touched a nerve in his brain. The drone immediately went unconscious, falling to the floor. Danny phased out of the body and looked to make sure the two humans he'd saved were still in position. Mr. Ferones eyes flicked over to the body on the ground with concern, but he remained still.

The drone who had been driving looked back at his comrade, confused. Before he could report the abnormality to their leader Danny had him unconscious as well.

When the driver drone fell off the chair, Danny quickly phased out of him and took over the controls, becoming visible. He checked the bangs falling over his eyes quickly, making sure they were still black. He sighed with relief when he saw they were. He was getting better and better at using his powers as a human.

"Ok, guys. You can stop the zombie act, now. We're clear." He told the full humans. They broke out of the uncomfortable position and jumped into each others' arms.

Danny smiled at the pair before moving his attention to the Ghost Zone outside the front window. He saw a few familiar paths and a few familiar lairs. He saw Walkers Prison in the distance, and from there calculated a route back to Skulkers. Suddenly, Danny remembered the Fenton Phones that had been in his ears before, only to find they were gone. When Anna saw his confusion, she sheepishly apologized because the drone that had been running her body had destroyed Danny's portable radios.

The two humans broke apart and sat down in the seats beside and across from Danny. There was a pause before anything else was said.

Mr. Ferone was the first to break the silence. "Danny, not to sound ungrateful, but I think you need to explain some things."

"As long as you guys are capable of keeping a few secrets."

Mr. Ferone waited a beat before asking, "Are you really the ghost prince? That's all I really remember knowing."

Danny sighed, knowing this question had been coming. He sighed dejectedly.

"Yea. I am."

There was silence for a few minutes after that as the two adults took this news in.

"That doesn't make sense." Mr. Ferone said, shaking his head in disbelief. "How can humans be royalty in the ghost's world?"

"They can't." Danny replied honestly.

The silence resumed. Danny dodged ghost rocks, expertly maneuvering the speeder. The Ferone's stared at him. It was almost as if they were having a contest to see who could figure out what was going on first. This went on for a solid ten minutes.

Ms. Ferone suddenly perked up, as if making a massive discovery. She smiled so widely that Danny was concerned her face might beak. Suddenly, without warning, she hopped up out of her seat and gave Danny a massive bear hug. Danny quickly stopped the vehicle to avoid running into any floating objects.

Mr. Ferone laughed. "Ok, Anna. You win. What's his secret?"

When Anna she broke away from Danny, she was beaming. She looked Danny right in the eye and said, "Danny Phantom."

Mr. Ferone's jaw dropped. He looked over Danny one more time, probably comparing the two.

"Wow. Amity Park is _blind_." He said a moment later.

Danny laughed. "You can't see what isn't there. No one thought half-ghosts could even exist, so they wouldn't have guessed Danny Phantom was one."

Mr. Ferone laughed. "I suppose so." He paused for a moment. "I suppose that also explains how you were able to overshadow us. You're a ghost."

"Yea. It was an accident in my parent's lab." Danny said. "It was right at the beginning of freshman year." Mr. Ferone fell silent. Two years was a long time.

Danny saw Ms. Ferone was still smiling at him with a look of awe on her face. He looked over at her and chuckled softly. "What's the smile for?"

Anna looked at him with the deepest of admiration as she answered. "I was out at the park with our daughter. She was ten years old at the time. There was a ghost attack, a big tree got blasted. It fell, Rosie was right underneath it. She might have been seriously injured; maybe even killed if Danny Phantom hadn't swooped down from the sky and pushed her out of the way. I ran to her, completely forgetting about the nine-foot-tall mechanical robot ghost attacking the park. He shot at us, and we both would have died for sure. For the second time that day we were saved. Phantom didn't even have time to put up a shield. So, to save our lives, he used himself as a shield. A few moments later, the mechanical ghost was in the thermos, and Phantom was bleeding out on the grass. I ran over to him, but before I reached where he was he was gone. We never even had a chance to thank him." Anna was tearing up. Danny would never admit it, but he was too.

"I remember that day. Skulker had just upgraded one of his weapons so it would hurt my human half too. To prove it, he fired at a few humans. I was so mad at Skulker after that, I didn't let him out of the thermos for a week. I was ok, though, I just had a friend bandage up the wound."

"This is incredible. It's always been you, saving so many people, dealing with stupid jerks like Baxter _and_ keeping it all a secret?" Mr. Ferone asked.

"Yea it's always been me. Oh, and by the way, for any incidents that made me seem like a bad ghost- I was framed." Danny said.

Mr. Ferone chuckled. "We figured. We're not entirely clueless. After you saved my wife and daughter we did some research, and found a few interesting facts. The mayor had red eyes during his supposed 'kidnapping' and the stolen goods were found in the possession of a human. Overshadowing and some kind of ghost controlling technology? We just decided to give you the benefit of the doubt about that christmas thing."

Danny laughed. "Another long story."

"Promise you'll tell me all these long stories you keep telling me about sometime?" Mr. Ferone asked, chuckling.

"I Promise. First though, let's get back to the others, ok?"

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Tucker's P.O.V.**

Tucker, Sam and Valerie took over operations at Skulker's Island after Skulker managed to lose the Ghost Prince. They sent out search parties all over the island in attempt to find them.

Sam and Valerie led the parties out with directions from Tucker, who was standing over a map back at Skulker's lair. He was barking orders into the Fenton Phones for his two friends. They had been following this system for about forty five minutes when suddenly, the three teen's were pleasantly surprised. There was a groan over a pair of Fenton Phones, and it wasn't from them.

"Hello!? Who's there?" Tucker said with a commanding tone into the earpieces. "If you can hear me and you are not Valerie or Sam, you had _better_ answer me!"

"Mr. Foley?" Lancer's groggy voice broke through the speakers.

Val, Sam and Tuck all breathed a sigh of relief. If the Fenton phones were somehow back in range, finding the others would much easier.

"Mr. Lancer we need you to help us find you guys. Do you know where you are? Who else is there with you?"

"We were ambushed. They knocked out the ghosts and Mr. Fenton, took Fenton, and left the rest of us there. When they were gone, we each grabbed as many unconscious ghosts as we could carry and ran away. They are surprisingly light so we're were able to get them all. We found a cave and crashed in here."

Sam spoke up. "They took Danny?" Her voice sounded sad.

"Yes, I'm sorry Ms. Manson."

Sam was quiet for a few moments. When she spoke again, her voice was hard and cold. "Mr. Lancer, make a fire close to the entrance of the cave. We're going to try to spot the smoke."

Valerie spoke, sounding angry. "I don't get it! How could anyone have snuck up on Danny? Wouldn't his ghost sense have gone off!?" Valerie said.

"Ghost sense?" Mr. Lancer asked.

"That, Mr. Lancer, is a story for another time." She replied, her voice as cold as Sam's.

"Well, if Mr. Fenton was relying on a ghost sensor to not be caught by surprise than I know exactly why we were. The man that knocked out Mr. Fenton was James Ferone, a teacher back at Casper. He came up behind Daniel, said 'Hello, your majesty.' and took him out with a rock." Tucker couldn't help but chuckle. His friend had been right. The rocks here were out to get him.

"That wasn't even the strangest part." Mr. Lancer continued. "He was wearing hot pink armor and his eyes matched it! I've never seen eyes like that in my life, and certainly never get on Mr. Ferone."

All three teens paled at Lancers description. Danny had told them about the pink soldiers. Why one of them looked like Mr. Ferone was a mystery to them.

Tucker sighed, adding this issue to his list of problems. The list was already almost a mile long.

"Mr. Lancer, wake the others with you and wait for further instruction." He said. He looked back to the map and stuck pins over any cave he found on the map of Skulkers Island, he planned to check every single one. If the group was on the island, he intended to find them. He assumed they were, if the Fenton phones were in range.

Mr. Lancers voice broke through the speakers once again, "The students are all awake, but the ghosts aren't waking up. We don't know what's wrong with them." The old teacher paused in contemplation. "Mr. Foley why would they take Daniel and not us? Clockwork was saying that Mr. Fenton was a prince, but Daniel assured us that it wasn't true. Then Mr. Ferone called him 'your majesty'. I don't know who to believe!"

"Ok, how about this. When we find you all, we will answer a few questions, but right now I think-" Sam spoke up, ever the negotiator. She probably got the trait from her parents.

Dash's voice cut her off. He hadn't lost his Fenton Phones. "A few?! Do you even know how freaking crazy this all is for us? We need like, a bajillion answers! 'A few' isn't going to cut it, Manson!"

Tucker could hear sounds of agreement from the class.

Sams irritated sigh cut through the classes complaining. "Fine. We'll make a deal about that when we find you guys, because right now it is not our main concern. Now, all of you work together to build a few fires around the outside of the cave. Stay in groups. Each group have a pair of Fenton phones. We're going to send out search teams to all the caves. Do not trust any ghost you see unless they say.." She trailed off, probably trying to think of a sufficient code.

Tucker grinned.

"Long live the Phantom." He said.

Sam and Valerie laughed. It was perfect.

Sam finished giving her instructions, chuckling. "So unless the ghost you see says the words 'long live the Phantom', do not trust them and call for help over the Fenton Phones. We can use the ghost to find you guys."

After agreement from the class, the three teens resumed their search, making sure to inform all the ghosts about the newly instated code. They began their search with the caves.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

As Danny and the Ferone couple approached Skulkers, Danny could see three columns of smoke rising up through the trees, so they landed near there. Perhaps the group was hiding out in the forest after the sighting of the Pink Soldiers. After they landed, they locked the two (still unconscious drones in the room they'd trapped Danny in; giving Danny an immense sense of satisfaction.

Danny transformed into his ghostly alter-ego, surprising the humans. He lifted them up above the trees and flew towards the smoke. He landed in a clearing and returned to his human form. They pushed through some bushes and were suddenly faced with the entrance of a cave. Around the area were three strong fires and a few smaller ones. He motioned for Mr. and Ms. Ferone to stay hidden in the trees.

"Hello?" Danny called into the cave.

"Fenton?!" A few voices called out from the cave. It was so dark that Danny couldn't see them.

"Yea, its me. Come on out."

"Dude! How did you get here? Didn't Ferone like, kidnap you?" Some guy asked.

"Well- its sorta hard to explain-" Danny started, before being cut off again.

"Fenton? why did that guy call you 'your highness'?" Another student called out. Before Danny could think of a lie to cover for himself, he was cut off once again.

"How do we know its you? You could be some evil robot or something pretending to be Fenton. Give us some proof." Dash called out.

Danny sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Ok, Dash, how's this for proof? I'm Daniel Fenton. I'm in grade ten at Casper high. We were on a ski trip when our stupid bus ran out of gas, somehow. We were attacked by Johnny 13. I was dumb enough to let my guard down while he was still there. An Observant used him to get you guys, then he used you guys to get me. He wanted me because there is a ghost in the human realm taking over the minds of humans. He uses them to attack the residents of the Ghost Zone. So, I brought Phantom. He and I are here to save the Infinite Realms and right now you guys are wasting an _ungodly_ amount of my time. So come on; we have to get moving, _now._"

"What makes you think you can order us around, Fen-toad?" Kwan asked.

"I can order you around because right now, none of you have any idea where you are or what you're doing, whereas I have been here a number of times and I know my way around. So you can either sit in that cave and starve to death or you can follow me to Skull Rock to meet up with Sam, Tuck and Valerie. Make your choice."

Reluctantly, the humans walked out, each carrying at least two ghosts. Most of the football players carried four or five.

Mr. Lancer looked happy to see Danny, but still confused. "Mr. Fenton, I'm grateful to see that you're ok, but I have to ask; how on earth are you here?"

"I think we can answer that." A voice snarled from the treeline. It was Valerie.

Mr. and Ms. Ferone were pushed out of their hiding spots in the trees. The two landed on the ground in clearing, and following them out of the trees were two of Danny's best friends. Sam and Valerie stepped out of the bushes behind them. Sam had two human handguns, each pointed at one of the Ferone's on the ground. Valerie had her favourite ecto-pistol pointed at Danny's head.

Valerie was aiming from quite far away, but Danny didn't underestimate her.

If Valerie pulled that trigger, _she would not miss._


	9. Answers

_**A message to my lil bro Lukas, you should actually read the story instead of just reading my author notes. XD 333**_

_**Ok, guys.**_ **Idea 2 won, but I'm going to wait until I'm done writing this story to get it started because I really don't have time for two stories at once. Right now I don't actually have a full, thought out plan for this story- I'm sorta just making it as I go along so it takes longer to write. It seems to be working though so whatever. XD**

**Sneak peak of author just wingin' it right before last chapter:**

Here I am, sitting at my desk with my laptop open.

'So.' I think to myself. 'Should this be the chapter that Danny asks Sam out?

Then the devilish voice at the back of my mind says 'Naw, make the readers wait so they suffer longer. Oh, and end the chapter with a cliffhanger!'

Me: 'Ok. Whatever. So, should anyone find out about Danny's secret in this chapter?'

Devil: 'Maybe. If anyone does though, make it a _cliffhanger_! They will all suffer my cliffhanging WRATH!'

Me: 'Since when are my inner demons so evil?.'

Devil: '_If she pulled that trigger, __she would not miss__._'

Me: 'Damn, thats good.'

**So, thanks for the support guys! Keep reviewing!**

**Chapter 9**

**Third Person POV**

_Mr. and Ms. Ferone were pushed out of their hiding spots in the trees. The two landed on the ground in clearing, and following them out of the trees were two of Danny's best friends. Sam had two human handguns, each pointed at one of the Ferone's on the ground. Valerie had her favourite ecto-pistol pointed at Danny's head._

_Valerie was aiming from quite far away, but Danny didn't underestimate her. _

_If she pulled that trigger, she would not miss._

"Valerie.." Danny said slowly, raising his hands in surrender. "Why are you aiming that ecto-pistol at me?"

Valerie ignored him and spoke to the class. "That's not Danny. Thats a drone. The Leader has him under his mind control."

"WHAT?!" Danny and the Ferone's asked incredulously.

Valeries gun twitched slightly, and Danny went absolutely still. He kept speaking slowly and calmly. "Valerie if there are any ghosts around, they can clear both me _and_ the Ferones. If I were being controlled, a ghost listening in my mind would be able to hear the Leader's voice in there ordering me and all the other drones around. _Phantom_ figured that out from experience. He woke up Mr. and Ms. Ferone before we escaped. We have two drones captive in the ship they took Phantom and I in."

Valerie and Sam lowered their guns slightly, but didn't put them away.

"What are your names?" Sam asked, talking to all three of the newcomers. Her voice broke slightly when she looked over at Danny.

"Anna Ferone"

"James Ferone"

Danny paused, wondering if he should say his _whole_ name. He smiled widely at Sam and chuckled to himself. He bent over and picked up a rather large leaf. He then carved his full name onto it with a pebble. He held it up in front of his chest as if he were taking a mug shot.

Sam stepped forward, holstering her two handguns. She was almost within Danny's arm length when she stopped. She looked closely at Danny's eyes. She looked from a few different angles to make sure that the blue she saw weren't from colored contacts. When she was sure of that, she picked the leaf out of his hands.

The leaf itself was about the size of both her palms. Written on it was Danny's full title.

_Daniel James Fenton/Phantom, High Prince of all the Ghost Zone and it's certified inhabitants. _

_Fear me._

Sam burst out laughing at the reference to the 'Ghost Gabber'.

After her laughter subsided a bit launched herself into Danny's arms with relief, almost knocking him over. She was mumbling about how she was worried sick the whole time he was gone. He held her close and said nothing. The two just enjoyed the moment for a few seconds before hearing Valerie laughing. She had picked up the leaf that Sam had dropped and had read it.

When she was done she crushed the leaf between her fingers so the wandering eyes of the other humans wouldn't reach it.

Valerie turned to Danny, "Sorry we doubted you, but we had to be sure, you know? We just spoke with the Ghost Writer a little while ago. He knew we were dealing with mind control from our description of Mr. Ferone, but he didn't give us much else. He said they won't know their own names and their eye color would be different. When we saw them in the bushes and you out there, totally unharmed.."

Danny laughed. "You know, I'm almost offended. You guys have less faith in me then I thought." He paused, motioning his friends to move out of earshot with him. They moved over to the Ferones so that they could be included in the conversation. The other humans were all huddled around, whispering hurriedly probably trying to figure out what had just happened.

Danny continued. "I have some information about this kind of thing from my lessons with Clockwork. He told me how to free a mind-control victim- you have to tell a drone their real names. As long as they hear it they will automatically be freed. It's pretty cool."

Danny told them the rest of the story as well, about how the Ferones found out about his secret, how he took out the drones, and how the leader probably knew all about him. The Ferones were mostly silent. They couldn't help but think about how amazing it was that this amazing secret had been kept for so long.

Danny had just finished catching up his friends when the class finally confronted them. Mr. Lancer stood at the front of the pack, glowering at the three teens.

"This has gone on for long enough. You will answer all of our questions before we do anything else, and that's final." Their English teacher looked more fed up than the trio had ever seen him before, and that was saying something.

Sam and Valerie were slightly angry that Mr. Lancer thought he could order them around, but Danny motioned for them to let him handle it. He called on his ghost core, and moments later Danny Phantom flew out of the trees at top speed, skidding to a halt beside Danny, Sam and Valerie. Every humans' jaw hit the ground except Sam's.

Sam just grinned and leaned over to Valerie who was looking shocked, whispering "_Duplication"_

Valerie's expression changed from confused to impressed, and whispered back, "He's getting better.

Sam nodded her agreement. Danny had never been able to duplicate in human form before now.

Phantom stood up straight, smirking. He hardly acknowledged the presence of everyone other than Sam, Valerie and Danny. "You guys are so slow. We expected you all back at Skulker's, like, half an hour ago."

Valerie smirked right back. "Yea, well, most of us can't fly there at two hundred miles per, Phantom. You're just going to have to be patient."

"Normally, I would accept that excuse. I don't, though, because it seems you guys haven't moved an inch since I was last here. Can you guys not move _any _faster?" Phantom said, raising an eyebrow.

Sam snorted. "Says the guy who has all the time in the universe. In case you forgot, you're a ghost."

"Touché." The white haired duplicate quipped between chuckles. "Ok, but seriously. We have to go guys. I have places to be, lives to save, afterlives to save, etc."

All of the students were ready to follow their hero, but Lancer wasn't fooled.

"Convenient, isn't it? The town hero shows up just as we were about to finally get some answers." Lancer said with an eyebrow raised. The class remembered the answers that they hadn't received yet and snapped back to attention

Danny sighed, looking at his duplicate. Phantom looked back at him, expression turned two had a silent conversation in their shared mind.

"_Damn, they're relentless._" The duplicate sighed.

"_I know right? This is going to be harder than we thought." _ Danny said telepathically.

"_If they aren't going to give in we'll just have to compromise._"

"_You talk to them. They respect white hair more than black._"

Phantom sighed, giving Danny an annoyed look. Then he spoke to the class "Fine. What do you want to know?"

He was answered by a cacophony of questions and yells from the teens.

"Do you play football?"

"Do ghosts eat? Do you like the Nasty Burger?"

"Why do you protect the town?"

"What happened with the mayor?"

"Marry me?!"

Danny spoke up for his duplicate, who was hiding behind Sam.

"GUYS." Danny upped the volume of his voice with a bit of a ghostly wail, but not one big enough that the humans noticed. They only noticed how loud he was.

They were silenced.

"That's better." Danny said. "Now, me, Sam, Val and Phantom will each answer _one_ question. If you complain, you aren't allowed to ask any. So think about what you want to know while we walk to Skull Rock, we will answer as soon as you all reach a decision, Mr. Lancer will be the one to ask the questions. Now come on." he started walking in the direction of Skull Rock, and to his relief, they all followed him.

With that, the group was on their way. They left the unconscious ghosts in the cave, they would only get in the way and they would be completely defenceless. The main four (well, three unless you count the duplicate) and the Ferones walked ahead and out of hearing range from the class, chatting with Tucker over the Fenton Phones on the way. They made sure that they were on a different channel than the class, of course. They told Tuck the story while the class lagged behind, arguing about what to ask.

Finally, the class approached them.

Danny and Phantom sighed simultaneously, reminding them both to remain focussed so that they didn't merge by mistake.

"Sorry, Tuck. The class has finally reached a verdict. We're going to have to go." He said.

"No problem, dude. Call back later." Tuckers voice sounded grainy over the Fenton Phones.

"Will do." Danny shut off his Fenton Phone.

"Ok, Mr. Fenton. We've decided what we want to know. Who will answer their question first?"

"I'll go." Sam said when none of her other friends seemed too keen to go first.

"Ok, Ms. Manson. What did you tell Valerie when Phantom first arrived? You two were whispering."

Sam paled slightly, fumbling for a lie.

"The truth, if you don't mind." Mr. Lancer said sternly.

The goth in question sighed, running her fingers through her hair.

"Valerie was surprised when Phantom showed up because he was supposed to be on the other side of the island. So I told her it was the power Phantom has just recently mastered." She looked over at the duplicate. "Duplication."

Mr. Lancer was unconvinced. "Why be secretive about that?"

"How many members of the 'PhanClub' are here today? Now that they know, everyone will know. It could have been used as a surprise attack before now." Sam said, scowling.

Lancer bought the mostly-truth and moved on. "Valerie?" He asked.

"Sure." She said, looking slightly nervous.

"Do you know the Red Huntress? Personally?"

"Yes I do. She's a friend. I'm the one who convinced her to stop hunting Phantom." Valerie's lie was smooth, and the other teens were impressed. Lancer didn't stop there, though.

"We heard some of your conversation with Johnny 13- when you all first arrived in the Ghost Zone. We were in range for part of you conversation and we heard through the radios. You called the biker ghost '_spook_' and it reminded us of the Huntress. At first we thought she was here with you all but we haven't seen her."

"No, she couldn't make it. She had to stay behind to protect Amity while Phantom was gone. She might be under the mind spell now." Sam said, covering for her friend. She hid her shock at what Lancer had said. How much more of the conversation had they heard?

"What about that creepy growl we heard?" one girl asked. Some students around her agreed.

"I dunno. It must have been from outside the bus or something." Valerie said. She thought she was telling the truth- she didn't really remember all the details of Danny's outburst.

"No, it was through the Fenton Phones. It was definitely on your guys' end." Another kid backed up the girl.

"I remember that. It was Phantom, he was pretty pissed off that I stole his humans." Everyone jumped away from the trees in surprise. Johnny and Skulker stepped out.

Both Danny and Phantom raised the same eyebrow at the same time, asking "What are you guys doing here?". They sounded like one person in different bodies, (which they were, but most of the humans there didn't know that). There were questioning glances from the class and Lancer.

Johnny smirked at Danny's slip up. "We came to find you guys. You were taking too long."

"Wow. Ghosts are really impatient." Dash said. The two Danny's snorted at how hypocritical that statement was, and it was then that they started to worry. If they kept acting at the same time like this, it was going to be noticed.

"Well, we aren't done asking questions, so you're going to have to wait a bit longer." Lancer said to Johnny and Skulker. Then he turned to the duplicate. "Phantom, you're up. Why did you follow us into the Ghost Zone?"

"What kind of teenage superhero would I be if I didn't?" He said smirking. Danny had to fight the urge to say the words along with his copy. He had to stop using the duplicate soon. He felt himself slowly being drawn back into one.

Lancer gave Phantom the stink-eye, sending a clear message that that wasn't going to cut it.

The duplicate sighed with frustration and shot a quick side glance to Danny. Danny thought for a moment before speaking through the duplicate.

"Ok, fine. I feel guilty about you all being brought into the middle of this crap. You should all be skiing in the mountains right now, not in the Infinite Realms fighting off starvation and mind-control ghosts. I blame myself, so when Fenton told me what happened over the phone, I had to come. If I'd only worked a bit harder to gain the trust of the Observants this whole thing could have been avoided. It's my fault, so I'm not going to sit on the sidelines and watch you all die out here."

Danny didn't have time to observe their reactions to this. He and his copy both suddenly became extremely light headed and wobbled on their feet. Thankfully, Mr. Ferone had been watching both Danny's intently and caught them by the elbows. Danny thought for a moment that he might pass out, but the dizzy spell passed. Danny knew what was going on- he had experienced this feeling during training. He and the duplicate were being pushed to their limit. He knew that if either of them spoke, they would speak completely in sync, probably blowing Danny's secret. Their movements would also match. Danny knew that he would have to merge with his duplicate very soon and that if he didn't on his own they would be forced together.

That would be hard to explain to the class.

Then again, so would both Danny's having dizzy spells at the same time with only a math teacher keeping them on their feet.

The class was just about to ask what was going on when Danny was both saved, and screwed, by a ghostly scream.


	10. The Leader

**Nothing to say today, so on to the story!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 10**

**(Third Person P.O.V.)**

Both Danny's flew into a battle stance facing the direction of the scream. They saw Skull Rock not far away, and in the eye sockets of the skull there were flashes of pink light.

"Dammit!" The two cursed in total sync. They both started running towards Skull Rock and disappeared into the bushes. There was a flash of white light a moment later, signaling Danny's merge with his duplicate and his transformation into Phantom.

"Valerie, protect the others until you've found a safe place to put them. Hurry over as soon as they're hidden. I'm going after Danny!" Sam said, then started running in the direction Danny had gone.

Skulker quickly turned to Valerie. "There is a log cabin not far out from here in that direction." He pointed out east into the trees. "Just walk in that direction and you'll find it soon."

He and Johnny took off towards Sam. Skulker grabbed onto her as he flew by and carried her with him. Sam didn't seem to complain and accepted the faster form of transportation. The three flew off at top speed towards Skull Rock.

Valerie sighed, looking at her classmates and teacher with an exasperated look.

A few of the popular kids looked annoyed at what Sam said.

Dash, like always, quickly voiced his complaints. "We don't need a babysitter. Plus, what could Gray possibly do to protect us? She's just a poor loser who probably can't even.."

He was cut off as a ghost tiger flew out of the treeline and onto the path they'd been walking along. Most of the humans screamed.

Valerie, on the other hand, simply rolled her eyes at the nuisance. _Great, just what I need right now. One of Skulkers pets._

Thinking fast as the tiger circled the group, ready to pounce, Valerie came up with three courses of action. One, she could try to run. Unfortunately, there was no way any of them were fast enough to outrun that thing. Two, she could pull out an ecto gun without her armor, probably causing the beast to charge before she even had a chance to pull the trigger. Without the hard, ghost proof shell that her armor provided, the ghost tiger would have no trouble taking her out with its claws or fangs. Three, she could reveal herself in front of a bunch of her peers. She decided that she only really had one option.

"Well, it probably wouldn't have stayed a secret over this ski trip from hell anyways." She mumbled to herself dejectedly.

Valerie let her red and black armor appear before leaping at the tiger. She landed just a few feet in front of it and slashed at the creature with a blade infused with ectoplasm so the ghost couldn't phase through it. The large feline hissed and clawed at Valerie, but her suit protected her. She chucked a few small, marble-like devices as a retaliation. The devices blew apart, not harming the tiger but effectively scaring it off. The beast took to the trees. She turned back to the class, whose jaws were hanging open in total awe at the scene before them.

Valerie smirked. "What were you saying, Dash? You don't need help from a poor loser like me?"

A few of the students' eyes widened in fear, and multiple people apologized for Dash's stupidity.

Valerie laughed at the students' reactions. "Relax, guys, I was messing with you. Now come on, we have to go find Skulkers cabin. I'll answer your questions later."

Thankfully, the class was smart enough to listen to her.

They took off into the woods, everyone sticking close to Valerie. They trekked through the bushes until reaching a small clearing, where, to Valerie's relief, a small log cabin rested, hidden under the trees. She would have completely missed it if she'd been flying.

She was about to pull open the door when she felt a hand on her shoulder, pulling her back. Acting entirely on instinct, she grabbed the person's arm, kicked out one of their ankles and had them completely immobile on the ground in under three seconds. Valerie was straddling the person facedown and was holding their arm above their back in an awkward position.

It finally registered in her mind that the boy she had trapped was none other than Kwan, and she let him go angrily.

"What the hell, Kwan?!" She asked.

The jock in question was sitting up with a groan and was rolling his shoulder in attempt to ease the pain. "I was about to ask you the same thing.." He grumbled.

"Kwan, what's wrong? Why'd you try to stop Valerie from going in?" Mr. Lancer asked, ever the peace keeper.

"Well, in all the movies when someone walks into the spooky cabin there are tons of booby traps. The first one is usually by the door."

Valerie rolled her eyes. "Oh for the love of.."

"Dude. Use your brain. Why would there be a booby trap? Skulker told us to come here!" Matt pointed out.

Kwan sighed. "Just humor me, ok?"

Valerie looked exasperated but she stepped aside.

Kwan grinned and walked up to the door. He examined the door for a moment before slowly turning the knob. The door opened slowly and for a moment the humans held their breaths.

Nothing happened.

Valerie smirked at the disheartened jock. "Thanks for that, Kwan. I'm so glad you're here to.." She was cut off because just as she walked through the doorway, the door itself was pushed open the rest of the way, hitting an unseen button. A large axe came down just inches in front of her face, barely missing her.

Many humans screamed at the surprise, but calmed down when they saw their peer was unharmed. Valerie turned around slowly and walked back outside with a shocked look on her face.

"I AM THE SMARTEST MAN ALIVE!" Kwan hooted victoriously, "Hate to say I told you so, but I totally did!"

There were a few moments of silence where no one moved.

Dash was the first to break out of his shocked stupor. "Kwan?"

"Yea?"

"If I ever call you stupid again, punch me in the face."

"Will do." Kwan laughed.

Valerie snapped out of her shock next, saying simply, "I think you guys will be safer outside with the ghost beasts then you will inside that cabin."

She paused, trying to think of a new plan. They could search for another cave, but there was no guarantee that they would find one anytime soon, and the others needed her at the rock.

Dash stole her attention away from her planning with a very up front question. "So how long have you been the Red Huntress?"

"Since the Red Huntress first appeared." She said simply, not really focused on what he was saying. She was still thinking about a plan.

"Why were you hunting Phantom?" Emily asked.

"I thought he was bad, and I guess I'm not huge on forgiveness. It was just recently that I realized the man feeding me bad information about him was evil himself. So, I found Phantom and we talked out our differences. He's actually one of my best friends now."

"How did you know that Phantom was good, though? Just because one evil guy told you he was evil, that doesn't necessarily make him good."

"It was a couple different things, actually. The first was that Phantom had actually tried to warn me a couple times about the evil guy; I just never believed him until I saw the proof myself. A few days later I saw Phantom just lying on a rooftop, looking at the stars. We started talking and I was amazed at how normal he seemed. It felt almost like I was talking to an old friend. The biggest part, though, of my accepting him, was when he told me why he protects Amity Park." Valerie thought back to that moment with a grin.

~FLASHBACK~ (Valeries P.O.V.)

"_Hey, Valerie?"_

"_Yea?"_

"_Can you keep a secret?"_

I was pretty shocked at this. What had I done to deserve Phantom's trust?

"Sure. No one knows who the Red Huntress is, right?"

"I know." Phantom said with a chuckle.

"Ok, well that's different and now we're entirely off topic." I chuckled with him.

"Yes, you're right. It's just… I've never told anyone this before. I'm kinda stressed out." Phantom nervously.

"You're planning on telling the girl that has been hunting you for almost _a year_ a secret that _no one else knows_?"

"Well it sounds stupid when you say it like that!" He said indignantly. "Besides, you'll be the fourth person who knows."

"But you said you haven't told anyone before..?"

"The first two people were there when it happened. The third figured it out. My two best friends and my sister."

I paused, just staring at him. "Are you ever planning on telling me or are you just going to beat around the bush like this all night?"

The ghost sighed. "I didn't plan on it being this hard to tell you."

"If it's that big you don't have to tell me."

"No, it's ok. I can do this... Valerie, I'm only hal-" He was cut off by an ecto-blast to the chest. The blast threw him off the opposite side of the roof.

"Phantom!" I called in shock in the direction Phantom had disappeared to. I turned around to see a none other than Jack and Maddie Fenton on the roof of the building across the street.

_Wow, how did we miss that?_ I couldn't help but think.

"Huntress!" Maddie Fenton yelled into a megaphone, "Don't listen to that evil pile of ectoplasm, he has you brainwashed! Come quietly, we only want to help get you away from his influence!"

I was surprised at how angry the words against Phantom made me. Somehow, in one night, I'd completely switched sides.

I turned on the speakers of her suit so her voice carried over to the ghost hunters.

"I think I'll pass, actually." My voice was laced with venom.

"You don't have a choice! You're under the influence of a ghost! Phantom is a menace!" Maddie tried to reason with me. Somehow, that made me even angrier.

"I'll tell you what, you can take your stupid, premature opinions of Danny Phantom and you can _shove them up your_-" I was cut off when suddenly I fell through the roof. I found myself inside the building on the top floor.

Phantom was on the floor laughing _absolutely hysterically_. There were tears streaming down his face he was laughing so hard. When he saw my confused look, he laughed even harder.

"What!?" I asked, frustrated.

"You should have seen the faces of the people in the street below!" He said between laughs.

This made me chuckle a bit, too. If I'd been a bystander to the argument between the Fentons and I, I'm sure my face would have been hilarious.

Suddenly I remembered what had interrupted our conversation in the first place. "Oh my gosh! The ecto-blast! Are you ok?"

"It's ironic, actually, that they happened to use that particular gun tonight. They pretty much just made sure that you'd find out my secret." Phantoms laughter had calmed to a chuckle now.

"What do you mean?"

Phantom, still on the ground, held out his feet in front of me. That was the first time that is noticed the black sneakers instead of his normal white boots.

"That's your secret? Different shoes?" I asked sarcastically.

Then, suddenly, a white ring of light appeared around his legs, changing the bottoms of his jumpsuit into a pair of blue jeans.

Phantom laughed. "Ok, I guess I should probably tell you the secret now before the gun's effects do for me, huh?"

"What exactly does the gun do?" I asked nervously.

"It pretty much shuts down my ghost energy."

"What?!" I asked, panicking. "What will happen to you?"

"My ghost energy will disappear until I get to my parent's lab. They have a machine that counters the effects of the gun."

"You're confusing me. Your parents study ghosts? You didn't mention that."

"I told you I wasn't going to tell you who my parents were yet. Now, I guess I am. My parents are the two lunatics that just shot me. If I were a normal ghost, I would power me down to a pile of goo. My parents would normally collect that goo, bring it to the lab, and bring me back to normal so they could dissect me." Danny was cut off as the top half of his suit was replaced with a black t-shirt with his logo on the front.

I was too shocked to shocked to form an actual sentence. "The Fentons..? Not normal... goo?"

Danny chuckled. "You'll get it in a few seconds. The last change won't be long, now."

I tried to process what the ghost was saying. His parents were Jack and Maddie Fenton? What did he mean by 'not normal'? Did his parents know they were attacking him? What was the last change?

Danny, meanwhile, looked like he was in some pain from whatever the gun was doing to him, I still didn't really understand it. He was shaking slightly, and curling in on himself a bit, almost as if he were trying to block out the pain. I felt a twinge of guilt. For so long I had believed that ghosts didn't feel pain, how often had I caused him pain like this?

Danny stole my attention with a final cry of pain, before the biggest ring yet appeared around his waist. It traveled all the way around his body, changing his black shirt to white, and his black shoes to red. Finally, his white hair disappeared, leaving black.

It was at this moment that I realized what was going on.

Dani had done the same thing. Same white ring, same inverted color change, same end result. She had gone from human to ghost in the blink of an eye.

Phantom was changing from ghost to human.

Danny Phantom… to Danny Fenton.

Danny, as if to confirm her suspicion, finally opened his eyes. They had been squeezed shut in obvious pain. The ectoplasmic green was gone, and in it's place were ice blue eyes.

He spoke, "I had an accident in the lab. The portal, when I first turned it on, zapped me with an enormous amount of ghost energy and electricity." He paused for a moment in thought. He looked up at me when he continued. "I protect Amity because if I hadn't turned the portal on in the first place, ghosts would never be able to come in through it. There would not be a single ghost in Amity if I hadn't been too curious for my own good. Now, I'm a half-dead superhero, and ghosts invade Amity on a daily basis. It's my fault."

I smiled reassuringly, and offered him my hand. He took it, and for the second time that night, I helped him back up. This was the beginning of the fifth member of Team Phantom.

~END FLASHBACK~

I broke from my thoughts when Lancer called my name.

"Sorry, say again?" I asked.

"You were about to tell us why Phantom protects Amity."

I laughed. "No I wasn't. I was just saying that I trusted him because he told me. I don't plan on telling you guys though. That's his secret to tell, not mine."

The whole class groaned. I, of course, completely ignored them.

"Ok, I've decided what we're going to do next. I'm going back into that deathtrap, and I'm going to clear one room of traps and you all are going to stay in that one room."

"Val! You'll get killed in there!"

"Ms. Grey, I can't allow that.."

"Thats an awful idea."

Most of the class started complaining at my plan. I rolled my eyes.

"Guys, I'll be fine. Besides, I'll have Kwan to guide me."

"WHAT?"

"That plan is even worse than the last one. It's terrible."

Kwan paled tremendously.

"HEY!" I yelled, shutting them up. I'm not taking him in with me, that's stupid."

I reached into a compartment of my suit and pulled out a visor-like device. I put it over Kwan's eyes. He turned his head in my direction, and he laughed.

"Hey, I can see myself. Weird." He said.

I rolled my eyes. "You can see whatever I see. So, while I'm walking around in there, you point out potential traps. Ok? You just stay here with the others."

Before anyone could argue, I walked into the house, putting my life almost entirely in the hands of my reflexes and Kwan's knowledge of horror movies.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

I dodged another pink blast, returning the shot and knocking out another soldier. They seemed endless. I had already evacuated the less powerful ghosts, so at the moment me, Sam, Tucker and about twenty powerful ghosts were holding off hordes of soldiers. We weren't losing, but we weren't really winning either. They just kept getting up after we knocked them down.

We'd been at this for about ten minutes when Tucker reminded us of how brilliant he is.

"Peter Smith!" I yelled, and one of their soldiers collapsed.

I looked through the crowd while fighting off the closer soldiers. Most of them were from Amity, I recognized them from around town (Amity Park is a small town, lots of people know each other) but I didn't know them by name. Then I had an idea.

I flew up above the crowd and turned invisible. The soldiers below didn't even seem to notice, they just continued attacking the others. I yelled as loud as he could,

"Jasmine Fenton!"

I wasn't sure if she'd heard it or not, or if she was there at all, so I just continued yelling people I knew.

"Madeline Fenton! Jack Fenton!" I supposed that we could convince my parents to help if they were there, as long as I was in human form.

I continued to yell names of people I knew, and Sam and Tucker followed my example. Even some ghosts were yelling names. To my relief, the crowd of soldiers were slowly diminishing.

A few minutes later, I was back on the ground fighting the remaining soldiers. The small, hot-pink army was being pushed back and the freed humans were hiding behind me, Sam, Tucker and the ghosts.

Then, completely out of the blue, the Pink army retreated out of Skull Rock. It was almost too easy, but at the moment, we were all too happy to care.

There was silence for a few moments. Then, Tucker and I looked at each other, smiled, and collapsed in exhaustion.

Sam laughed at our antics, and told us she was going to o find medical supplies for the humans. She walked oou of the Skull's main room

For a few minutes, the humans we freed from the mind control just wandered around, trying to find their family and friends. There were about a hundred or so. I assumed that most of them had been freed by Sam, her family had a lot of connections and her voice can be pretty loud when she wants it to be. I smiled at the thought of her.

Deciding that we shouldn't wait for the Soldiers to come back with more friends, I called upon one of the ghosts that I knew was here.

"Wulf?!" I called. My call was answered a moment later when the large green ghost appeared by my side.

"Mia amiko!" He said excitedly _My friend!_

"Kiel vi fartas?" I asked, worried for him. I had been practicing my Esperanto and it was almost flawless now. _How are you?_

"Mi estas nevundita. Vi?" _I am uninjured. You?_

"Mi vivas. Mi scivolis se vi povas fari vestiblo por ke mi sendu la homoj hejme?" _I'll live. I was wondering if you can make a portal for me to send the humans home?_

"Eble ni ne devas sendi ilin reen tuj. Kio se la fantomo kiu kaptis ilin faras tiel denove?"

_Perhaps we should not send them back immediately. What if the ghost who caught them does so again?_

"Laŭ Clockwork la lecionoj, la ĉefo devus esti nekapabla kontroli ilin denove nun ke ni liberigis ilin unufoje." _According to Clockwork's lessons, the leader should be unable to control them again now that we have freed them once._

Wulf shrugged and extended his claws, but I motioned for him to wait. I floated up above the crowd.

"Hey!" I called down to them.

I had everyone's attention immediately.

"Ok, so I get that you're all probably _very_ confused as to how you got here and such, but right now I can't do anything about it. Right now, I can't save to town on my own. I need you all. I need you all to come back to Amity with us, and then I need you to yell and scream the names of your friends and family around the streets. If you see anyone wearing outfits similar to the ones you're wearing right now, yell the names even more. Sam, Tucker and I can answer any questions you had right now."

"Where's my Danny you filthy blob of ectoplasm?!" Screamed a voice from the crowd.

_Oh, great. _I thought. _Mom._

"Uhhhh," I started, "He should be around here somewhere…" I called on my ghost form to make a duplicate. It would have worked, too, if I hadn't been shot in the back halfway through the process. I could hear Tucker, and surprisingly, Jazz call out as I hit the ground. A few more humans voiced their concern as well as they searched for the source.

My eyesight blurred, slightly, and I began to get a bit concerned. I had no Idea what the purpose of this gun was, and it didn't feel at all like the other guns I'd been hit by during the fight, and a moment later I realized why.

"Well, well, well. If it isn't his majesty himself." A voice sneered from the entrance of Skull Rock.

It was a ghost, I could tell by the being's spectral tail. He had bright, pink eyes. The shot that I'd been hit with hadn't been from a gun, it was from a spectre.

I knew exactly who it was.

The Leader.

I growled as I stood up to face the ghost. He was obviously very powerful, or his attack wouldn't have hurt me as much as it did. This being was almost as strong as Pariah Dark.

I flew at the Leader, and I would have hit him if it hadn't been for one beautiful, outgoing, caring and amazing thing.

The ghost raised his fist, and in it was a small, frisbee like contraption. He dropped it to the ground and a hologram appeared. It was Sam, unconscious in a cage.

I stopped in my tracks.

"I have no quarrel with you, Phantom. I only want the human world. You can go on with your business here and I'll be fine. I just want your word that you won't bother me and she can go free."

"Apparently, you didn't do your homework on me. I don't live here. I live in the human world. You attacked my home. For that, and for Sam, _you will pay dearly._" I growled. My eyes were probably blazing red, and Tucker and Jazz seemed to realize that I was beyond reach. They knew the Leader had just signed his own death warrant. They told all the humans to run, which all of them did, except the ever-stubborn Maddie Fenton. (Tucker and Jazz tried especially hard to get her out, knowing that she shouldn't see this side of her son… Even if she didn't know it was her son.)

It seemed that the Leader had just realized his mistake in taking Sam. He seemed to pale slightly at the my glare, but he held his ground.

"How would _she _feel if she found out you killed me because of her?" The leader asked.

If I had been in control, I would have listened. I wasn't, though, and I didn't. I advanced on the Leader slowly, ready to pounce the second he moved.

What happened next happened fast. Too fast. The Leader saw something that I didn't, and he took the opportunity. He threw himself at me and I launched myself at him. Suddenly, just as we were about to collide mid-flight, he teleported. I was about to teleport to where I felt his ecto-signature (that I could sense was still in the ghost zone), when my world went bright blue.

**(I'll be nice and not end with a cliffy like I did last chapter. I'll give you guys a nicer ending. XD)**

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

Everyone was still. Danny had disappeared into Valerie's Thermos, which she'd been aiming at the Leader before he'd teleported. The Leader had seen her. He'd made sure Danny couldn't follow him right away. He gave himself time to escape.

"Damn it," cursed Valerie. She was about to free Danny, when Tucker, of all people, stopped her.

"NO!" He yelled. Valerie's hand froze over the lid.

"What is it, Tucker?" Valerie asked.

"Wait for him to calm down. He was about to completely obliterate that ghost. Evil or not, that's not how we do things. He would have regretted killing the Leader for the rest of his life, and Sam would have felt the guilt of being the reason he felt all of that guilt. He would have been a total _mess._"

"Yea, I guess you're right. He's going to be pretty peeved when we let him out, though. He might not be entirely calm yet. What do you suggest?"

"We follow Danny's plan," Cut in Jazz. "We get Wulf to help us send everyone back to the human realm. We get them somewhere safe. We free as many humans as we can. Then, as soon as we're all settled, we go to the lab in my basement and open the thermos into a ghost shield so he can't hurt anyone. eventually he'll snap out of it and we can work from there on rescuing Sam and the other humans."

Tucker grinned. "Sounds like a plan."


	11. A Change in Perspective

**Hey guys! Sorry this chapter is so late and so short! (dumb writers block)**

**Thanks for all the feedback on the last chapter! Speaking of, I got a much appreciated surprise this week…**

**WE HIT 100 REVIEWS! :D YAY! Thanks for all the support guys!**

**Chapter 11**

**Maddie Fenton P.O.V.**

I stood in complete awe as Jazz, Tucker and The Red Huntress **(A/N Valerie hadn't changed out of her suit yet) **discussed our next course of action.

".. back to the human realm. We get them somewhere safe. We free as many humans as we can. Then, as soon as we're all settled, we go to the lab in my basement and open the thermos into a ghost shield so he can't hurt anyone. Eventually he'll snap out of it and we can work from there on rescuing Sam and the other humans." Jazz was saying.

"Sounds like a plan." My son's best friend grinned.

I was amazed at how calm they were. Danny appeared to be missing, Sam and been kidnapped by an evil mind-control ghost and we didn't appear to have any form of transportation.

After everything had sunken in a bit and I finally found my voice, I approached the group of friends.

"Now just hold on, there. You're all just a couple of teenagers; I think we need to get the other adults in here so that we can decide our next course of action-"

"On the contrary, Ms. Fenton, I think these teenagers are the most capable people here for leading us to safety." A new voice echoed in the near empty room.

Tucker smiled as he turned around. "Mr. Ferone! Good to see you. You must be Ms. Ferone, it's a pleasure to finally meet you." Tucker spoke to the woman next to his math teacher.

Tucker paused for a moment, then broke out laughing. "Hey, pink's a good color on you, Mr. Ferone!"

I looked, confused over at the pair. They both wore the same battle armor that I did.

The math teacher snorted. "Not my first choice."

"Where were you guys?" The Red Huntress asked. "You two disappeared before I went into Skulker's deathtrap of a house." She rolled her eyes at the last part of her sentence.

Tucker's eyes widened. The shock soon turned into exasperation looked that clearly read 'we-will-be-discussing-this-later.'

She shrugged, ending the silent conversation.

Mr. Ferone chuckled. "We figured that you all might need some transportation, and by the large amount of humans waiting out back, I think we were right. We brought the vessel that we'd originally kidnapped Danny in-"

"WHAT!?" I screeched. I lunged for the man but was pulled back by none other than Tucker. I was surprised at his strength.

"Ms. Fenton, calm down! We can't fight amongst ourselves if we're going to make it out of the Ghost Zone."

I was shocked at Tucker's disregard for the man's words. Apparently he knew something I didn't. "But Danny…" I started, but was soon cut off.

"They don't have Danny, Ms. F. They were under the mind control but Danny woke them up and drove them all back here. He is perfectly safe and is preparing for our arrival in the human realm. We sent him ahead early to establish a safe house." Tucker said calmly. I stopped struggling against Tucker and he let go of me.

"You sent Danny ahead?" Asked Ms. Ferone with a look of total shock and confusion.

I raised an eyebrow. Why was she confused? The strategy made perfect sense to me.

None of the teenagers said anything. I looked back at them just in time to see Red pointing a finger at the thermos that we had Phantom trapped in.

She quickly stopped when I turned around, so I pretended not to notice. I looked back to the Ferones, whose expressions were even more shocked than before. Jazz sent them a look that said 'we'll-explain-later'.

_Wait. Jazz?_

Jazz was involved with this web of lies as well? I'd thought she was just offering to help the other two discuss a course of action. I felt slightly hurt. Jazz has never kept anything from me in the past. Why start now?

"So, how do we get back to the Human Realm?" Mr. Ferone asked. "We have the ship but we don't have a portal, as far as I've heard."

"Don't worry, Mr. Ferone. We have that part covered." Tucker said with a sly grin. He let out a high pitched whistle and a massive ghost phased through the ceiling. Tucker grinned and said a few words in a tongue I didn't recognize. The creature responded in the same language. The two spoke for several minutes before Tucker spoke to the rest of them.

"Wulf said that he spoke to Phantom before he lost it on the Leader. They already arranged that Wulf'll be helping us get home. The only issue was that he didn't know how he would keep the portal stable long enough to get so many humans through it. We should be fine, though, thanks to the Ferones. He's confident that he can get the ship through."

"Thats good news," Jazz said perkily.

"Yea. It's about time for some good Karma," snorted Red.

"We should leave now. We need to give the Leader the smallest window of opportunity as possible." I suggested.

We went out to confront the large group of humans and ghosts.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Sam's P.O.V.**

I woke up to a dark room; not that it mattered. Her vision would have been blurred anyways. She knew that from experience. Getting hit over the head that hard was bound to leave her vision wonky for at least an hour after her original awakening.

I sighed to myself. So, I'd been captured.

_Ok, Sam,_ I thought to myself. _Who, What, When, Where and Why?_

The Pinks, Humans (besides the Leader), Unknown, Unknown and probably to get Danny.

The last part of that sentence made me feel sick to my stomach.

What would he do when he found out?

I had a flashback to the original fight with Johnny that started this whole mess. Danny changed when he saw Shadow attack me. It was like he wasn't even Danny anymore.

I can't imagine the pain that Danny is going to bring when he finds the people that took me.

I smirked. I almost felt sorry for them.

I broke out of my thoughts as a light suddenly turned on in the room. It was blinding considering how dark it was when I first woke up. When I was used to the light, I started working on clearing my vision from when I got knocked out. It didn't work, so I gave up and just tried to look around a bit. I immediately noticed the cage that I was sitting in, and after that I noticed the ghost right outside it.

I knew it was a ghost for three reasons. For one, he was floating. Secondly, his skin had a reddish glow. The icing on top of the cake were his bright pink eyes. My eyes widened slightly. This must be the Leader.

My shocked expression turned into a scowl.

"Hello." I said, my voice dripping with venom.

He smirked. "You must be Samantha."

"If you're looking for someone named Samantha, then you got the wrong girl. It's Sam."

"My apologies." He said with mock sincerity.

"How long was I out..?" I asked with a groan.

"Oh, only a few hours. Not long at all." He replied, his voice annoyingly cheerful. He sounded as if he'd just cheated death. I thought about that for a few seconds, then thought of how mad Danny would be when he found my captor...

Maybe this guy _had _just cheated death.

"Why didn't you kill me?" I asked bluntly.

He chuckled humorlessly. "Because I'm not _stupid_. I don't need the Prince of the Dead as my enemy. What I do need is him to surrender the Human Realm to me."

I snorted at that.

"You'd be surprised at what the Halfa would do for you.." He said mysteriously. The Leader started walking towards the door in the corner of the room.

"_Hey_!" I yelled after him. The frustrated urgency in my tone made him pause.

"I'm human, you know! I need food, water, bathroom break! May I remind you what will happen if Danny finds out that you killed me?" She said with a raised eyebrow.

She noticed with satisfaction that the ghost paled slightly. He quickly regained his composure and sighed with exasperation. "Bathroom break every four hours, and two meals a day."

He tried to walk away and I stopped him again.

"Bathroom break now?" I asked with a mockingly innocent voice.

The Leaders red aura flared in irritation and I had to fight to not chuckle. I could work with his temper.

He sighed, his eyes narrowing at me in frustration.

In silent response, I raised an eyebrow, daring him to defy me. Defying me automatically extended to defying the High Prince and everyone knew how much of a mistake _that_ was.

After a pause he straightened his posture, signifying the return of his composure. He walked over to the small prison I was sitting in, obviously fighting to keep himself from lashing out. With a slight glare in my direction, he phased his arm through the bars, not even bothering to unlock the door of the cell. He grabbed my arm and pulled me through intangibly.

I came to the conclusion after walking out of the room that he didn't intend to let go of me while I wasn't in my cell so instead of trying to fight I tried to familiarize myself with the area we were walking through. I didn't get the chance to see much because we were at the bathroom in mere moments. I'd hadn't lied when I told him that I'd had to go so I was relieved when we arrived there.

The Leader roughly shoved me into the room and locked the door from the outside.

The bathroom was surprisingly nice for an evil ghost mastermind's lair. It had scented soaps, a clean shower, soft white towels; I felt like I was in a hotel. I saw a small window above the mirror, so I climbed up on the counter to get a closer look. It had bars, but I could still see through it.

We were in Amity Park. I could see the Fenton Works sign from here.

That thought sent a pang of guilt through me, I was probably being used to blackmail Danny at this very moment.

Sighing, I hopped down off the counter. **(A/N: This goes out to all the female viewers- I know, that at this moment, you feel Sam's pain. Boys, this is about to get really weird for you. Sorry! XD)** As soon as my feet hit the floor, I felt a feeling similar to the guilt that I'd just felt, except it wasn't guilt. I paled slightly. I knew that feeling.

My eyes widened. There was no way that I was _this_ unlucky. No way… It couldn't seriously be that time of the month while I was being held hostage by a mind- control ghost who was using me to keep my half-ghost secret love from beating him into oblivion… I can't be _that_ unlucky. Not two seconds later, I felt it.

It took me at least two minutes to fully process how much the universe hated me.

After those two minutes, I screamed bloody murder so loudly that the building shook.

**A/N: Poor Sam! I'm so evil… Anyways- hope you liked the chapter! Once again, sorry it's so short. **

_**I've got a week off school starting tomorrow, though, so I can probably finish at least three chapters to make up for it.**_

**Thanks!**


	12. Dark Danny

**EXTREMELY IMPORTANT NEWS THAT WILL AFFECT ANYONE READING THIS STORY:**

**I want to ****change the title** **because this title that I have right now SUCKS.**

**I'm welcome to any ideas! Put said ideas in reviews! I'll announce next week iif I'm changing it! **

**Shout out to Serulium, who has already started helping me choose the next title!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 12**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

Total darkness.

I cursed under my breath. I'm in the thermos.

I heard Valerie's voice, and then I saw the cap twist. Suddenly the cap stopped twisting and I heard Tucker yelling at the top of his lungs.

I took a moment to process this. Had Tucker just stopped Valerie from opening the thermos?

I heard most of the conversation between Tucker, Val and Jazz but I wasn't really paying attention to it. All I could really think about was how angry I was. Because they didn't let me out, they'd allowed the Leader to escape.

He'd escaped. With his afterlife. With _Sam_.

"He will _not_ be that lucky twice." I said to myself with a growl.

Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do at the moment. No one had ever escaped the thermos.

I paused.

I'm the _High Prince_ of all the Ghost Zone, and I had never even tried. Every other time that I'd been trapped in here I was just Danny Phantom.

Maybe I could escape now, though. Maybe.

I looked around the wall of the thermos. I could see some wiring, a few blinking lights and some ectoplasm patches here and there. I was about to start messing around with some things when I heard Tucker's voice, louder than before.

"_Hey!"_ he yelled. "_We have a plan and if you want to hear it, shut up and shut up the people around you!"_

There was a pause. I would have felt sort of proud of Tuck for taking charge like that if I was so angry with him.

"_We have a way to get everyone back to the human realm. Once we get there, stay off the streets no matter what and under absolutely no circumstances are you to confront any pink soldiers no matter who they look like. We don't know the side effects of the mind control for you, or the people still under it so we don't want to risk any-" _

Tucker was cut off by a snarky voice I didn't recognize. "_What do you mean you don't know the side effects? We could be dying or worse and you don't even have the slightest idea about it?"_

I snorted. Clockwork had dedicated a weekend long lesson to mind-control. There were side effects that I hadn't told them about. I didn't feel guilty about it, of course. He deserved it for what he did to Sam.

They can have fun with those side effects for all I care.

Tucker's voice broke through the walls of the thermos once again, "_Unfortunately, I only know three people who would have that kind of information, but I don't think that any of them are about to be of any help.."_

"_I think that whether or not they're helpful should be our choice." _Sneered the same masculine voice from before.

"_One is the evil mastermind that took over your minds in the first place, the second is in a ghostly coma and the third is literally on the brink of _insanity _because the Leader kidnapped the love of his life-"_

"_We're all on the brink of insanity here and if he is not evil or in a coma I think we need to ask for his help." _

There were noises of agreement from the crowd.

At this man's words, I laughed. I laughed loudly and hysterically.

"_Uhhhh, did that come from your soup thermos?"_ Came a ladies voice.

At the revelation that they could hear me, I couldn't help but grin. "You would all do well to listen to Tucker, here. I'm not about to help you."

"_And why the hell not? What'd we ever do to you?"_

"_You_? Nothing. I would tell you if you were going to suffer from any side effects. You aren't going to suffer."

"_Danny? You're not making sense-" _Jazz was using her 'I'm-extremely-concerned-for-your-well-being' voice.

I cut her off. "They don't have to deal with the side effects. But you three will."

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Leader's P.O.V.**

Kidnapping Sam Manson was a terrible idea. Terrible.

By kidnapping this girl I had made a lot of problems for myself. I had painted a target on my back the size of _Jupiter _because she had connections with humans _and _ghosts. I had an extremely hormonal teenager to deal with. Now, I had to research menstrual cycles to make sure my only leverage over Phantom didn't bleed out or something. I didn't want to know anything about this while I was alive; I want to know it even less now that I'm dead.

Terrible idea. Absolutely, without a doubt the most stupid, horrible, _terrible_ decision I've ever made.

I broke out of my thoughts when I walked past the room I was keeping my guest in. I considered turning around and walking away, but she was a human and she needed the plate of food that I had in my hand. I had to drop it off before I did any research.

'Kraft Dinner'. **(Disclaimer- I don't own this either XD)**

It looked disgusting, frankly. Not that I would know, I didn't try it. The noodles had all mushed together and it was full of little pieces of cardboard from the packaging.

Anyways, I was stopped outside the prisoners room, just staring at the door. I wish I could just take her mind and not have to deal with her anymore, but I don't want to piss off ghost royalty any more than I already have.

I sighed and pushed open the door. Her eyes landed on me the second I walked in and never left me until I was right by the cage. Then her eyes landed on the food.

"Oh my _God._ How do you mess up Kraft Dinner?! It is literally the easiest thing in the universe to make." She just stared in disbelief at the plate.

I glared at her. "I just did what the instructions said to do."

She just continued to stare in total disbelief at the plate.

I sighed and left the room, leaving Sam alone with the food.

Off to research female sex organs and menstrual cycles.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Three hours later, I had determined that Sam wouldn't die from period. I had also learned some things that I never wanted to learn about females.

It was worth it, though. At least my leverage against Prince Phantom would be able to continue doing her job for me. She wouldn't bleed out threw her... I can't even _think_ the word.

I pushed what I had learned out of my mind and continued to walk through the halls in peace, when suddenly I heard the most bizarre thing.

_Laughter._

I quickly followed the sound to it's source; which was apparently the kitchen.

I ran into the room, and sure enough Sam Manson was standing over a stove, making what appeared to be the same thing that I'd made her a few hours ago. Three female drones were with her, laughing at some inside joke or something. I hissed with fury.

"What in the seven hells are you doing in my base's kitchen?" I growled at Sam.

She turned away from the stove and flashed an innocent smile my way. "Well, since you botched my dinner, these kind souls took pity on me and allowed me to come and redo it. I also made cupcakes if you want some."

"Are you serious?!" I started yelling at the drones. "I gave all of you strict orders to not go in that room, _ever_, and you go in there and let her out to make _CUPCAKES?_ I made her perfectly good food earlier so tell me, what _exactly_ inspired you three to go directly against my wishes and let her out to bake?" I yelled at the top of my lungs.

Sams voice cut through my yelling. "You know, you really should try these cupcakes. It's a new recipe that I like to call 'shut the hell upcakes'. I baked them specially for you..." She batted her eyelashes mockingly.

The drones behind me giggled again.

I grabbed her and she cried out in surprise. I dragged her out into the hallway and started pulling her back towards the room. I was furious. She started trying to pull away from my grasp.

I gripped her wrist even harder.

Once we got back, I shoved her through the bars intangibly. To my satisfaction she rubbed her wrist, which appeared to be bruising.

"I cannot believe you!" I yelled at her. "You are a hostage! You don't bake cupcakes. You don't sass me. You don't brainwash my drones into giving you special privileges. You are the opposite of all those things. You have absolutely no rights in here. You are my prisoner, and if you know what's good for you, _you'll start acting like it._"

With that, I stormed out of the room and locked it behind me.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Tucker's P.O.V.**

Danny had fallen silent as soon as he'd dropped that last bomb. What he'd said hadn't made sense to the group of humans we'd saved, but it made perfect sense to us. These people would have side effects, but those side effects wouldn't hurt the people who had them.

The side effects would be a hindrance us because we were in charge of all of the people who would have these side effects.

Danny wasn't telling anyone the side effects to get back at me, Jazz and Val.

Mostly me.

"Hey! Foley!" called the same man from earlier. I think Sam called him George when she freed him. The dude was a tall, blonde haired man who looked like he pumped iron, like, fifty times a day.

"Yes, George is it?"

"Yea. Who is in the thermos? I think we deserve to know."

"Thats classified information, sir. I'm sorry." I said in all seriousness.

"Dude, you're like what, sixteen? What 'classified information' could you _possibly_ have?" Asked George.

I heard Valerie mutter something under her breath that sounded like our code from earlier, 'long live the Phantom'.

I chuckled.

"What's so funny? Something you wanna tell the rest of us?" asked a woman. She gave us a scrutinizing glare.

"You all should just come to terms with the fact that we can't disclose any information at this time, so for now what we're going to do is all board a ship and get back to the human realm." I pointed to Mr. and Ms. Ferone. "Those two people are going to lead us to the ship. Can we go now?"

The crowd was silent, which I took for a yes.

"Ok then." I motioned to Mr. Ferone and we started off towards the ship.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Valerie's P.O.V.**

I watched my boyfriend direct the crowd and get them moving. It was amazing what he could do when he set his mind to it. I smiled with pride.

That was one of the most short lived smiles of my life.

I felt a vibration from inside my Fenton Thermos. It's never done _that_ before. A few seconds later, it shook even more. I could hear some clicking coming from the inside.

My eyes widened with fear.

"Tucker!" I yelled, just a moment too late.

The cap of the Thermos burst open and a beam of blue light immediately followed. I, along with half the humans there shrieked in surprise.

Danny Phantom burst from the thermos and did a flip in the air.

He stopped moving and just floated above the group in total shock for a few moments. Then he hooted in total joy.

"YES! First ghost in the history of _ever_ to escape the thermos!" He looked down at his hands for a second.

"Hey... I'm back!" He looked at us with total relief in his now shining, green eyes.

Jazz, Tucker and I all smiled at our friend who was doing flips in the air. He stopped and stretched.

"Woah, that was _weird_. I was so angry that I just- I couldn't even think." He paused for a moment and looked a bit panicky. "I didn't do anything bad, did I?"

"Nothing you can't fix now." Jazz said. "Danny, are there any side effects to the mind control?"

"Yea, severe mood swings and sometimes violence."

"You didn't tell us this sooner, why?!" I asked. That would have been a good thing to know as soon as we freed them.

Danny looked considerate for a moment. "I dunno. I probably had something else on my mind."

"Yea, maybe evil thoughts of revenge on the Leader for taking Sam, perhaps?" Tucker said jokingly.

Jazz and I both panicked for a moment about Danny's reaction to that. What if he was offended and went dark, or something?

To our pleasant surprise, he laughed. "Yea, that could be it."

"Don't worry dude, she'll be ok. Now," Tucker turned to the large group of humans (whose jaws were pretty much on the ground in shock), "Shall we be going?"

"Wait just a damn second," George cut in, "_Phantom_ is the 'on-the-brink-of-insanity' dude that wouldn't help us?"

"Naw, that was Dark Danny. Phantom's back." Danny said with a smirk.

"We should come up with a name for that guy. He's like, Danny's inner demon. What's a good name for an inner demon?" I asked.

As we argued about a name, the group started walking and following Mr. and Ms. Ferone again.

"Bob."

"Nope. Steve?"

"You guys suck at naming things. We should name him Clyde."

"That's the worst one yet, Tuck."

"Alfred?"

"No way. Thats like a butler name."

"So an inner demon can't be a butler? That's racist."

"No it's not."

"It totally is, dude. Danny's inner demon? If you're listening, you can be anything you want. If you want to be a butler, be a butler."

Danny stopped in the middle of the path. This caused a chain reaction and suddenly no one was moving. His eyes burned red for a moment.

"Frankly, those names are all insulting. I don't want to be a butler, I want to be the demon who takes over Danny Phantom's mind and forces him to take over the universe." He paused and smirked. "Dark Danny will do."

Danny suddenly wobbled on his feet and collapsed. White rings appeared around his waist, but they disappeared after a moment.

No one moved for a few moments.

Jazz broke the silence first. "Danny!" She rushed to his side, quickly followed by Tucker and I.

Danny rolled over on the ground and groaned. "What the hell was that?" He asked.

"Dark Danny. That's what that was." I said with a sigh.

"So wait- we can just call for him and he'll just, show up? That's awesome! Hey, Mr. Dark Da-"

He was cut off by both Jazz and I tackling him.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

When we finally reached the vessel after a twenty minute walk, I was relieved. I had been getting funny looks the entire way here from the humans.

I walked into the ship and immediately checked on the pair of drones that we had hostage. They were still out cold.

All of the humans were still outside, which made what I had to do much easier.

I grabbed one of the drones and shoved him up against the wall. He woke up, eyes wide.

I glared right into his eyes, and he was so shocked that he could only stare back.

I kept my voice low and cold when I spoke. "Alright you mind-controlled piece of _shit_. You tell your leader _right now_ that if Sam is not back in my arms in under twenty-four hours that I will personally tear him apart molecule by molecule and he will be awake for _every second of it_. If she is in any way harmed then I will make it _even worse._ The rest of his afterlife will be absolute hell. I will find him. If he doubts that I can, remind him that I am the halfa. I am the Ghost Prince. I am Danny Phantom and _I will find him._ Tell him that right now and I might let you live. _Tell him. Right now."_

My glare never lessened for one second throughout my entire rant.

I could see the reflexion of my bright red eyes in his hot pink ones. The pink irises flared for a moment, probably indicating the message being sent.

We both continued to stare for several minutes before I slammed his head against the wall, knocking him out again instantly.


	13. Marked

**Sorry I'm so late! Enjoy!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 13**

**Jazz's P.O.V.**

Danny and Tucker had disappeared for a few minutes while we tried to herd all the humans aboard the ship. Val and I had just finished getting everyone aboard by ourselves and getting everyone settled. We were now sitting in the cockpit, waiting around for the boys to show up.

"Jazz!"

I turned at my name. Tucker was racing into the room with an enormous grin on his face. He was waving his PDA in the air like it was the olympic torch. The screen that had been dead for hours was lit up.

"What?" I asked with an irritated edge to my voice.

He snorted. "Wow, Jazz. Mood swings, much?"

"Oh, you're _hilarious._ Where were you?" I snapped back.

"They have electricity on this ship! I could finally charge Shirley!" He pranced around in joy.

Valerie and I rolled our eyes at Tucker at the same time.

"Have you seen Danny? We just need to find him and then we can leave." Valerie told Tuck.

"Nah, I didn't see anyone. I've been staring at my PDA screen filled with overwhelming joy for the past ten minutes."

"Great. Thats helpful." I said sarcastically with a slight glare at Tucker.

"Ok, Val, I know you and Jazz are girls so you have to be on the same side or whatever but you gotta help me 'cause I'm your boyfriend I don't think I can take all this emotional abuse! I could be psychologically damaged forever!" Tucker cried to his girlfriend in despair.

'Psychologically damaged' triggered yet another mood swing. Instead of angry I was feeling caring and protective (even more so than usual)

I rushed to Tucker's side and gave him a big hug. "Tucker! I'm so sorry about the harsh words! You're right, I was antagonizing you. Just remember, you don't need anyones approval but yours and as long as you maintain that positive attitude you can be your own person-" I was cut off by the door of the control room was thrown open.

"I'm back!" Danny said cheerfully.

Breaking away from my grasp, Tucker pranced over to his friend and waved his electronic in front Danny's face. "My PDA is charged!"

Danny laughed. "Great! Does that mean we don't have to listen to you complain the entire way home?"

"I still haven't been fed." Tucker said with a mischievous grin.

We all groaned. Tucker just laughed maniacally at our pain.

There was a knock on the door- and before we could answer the door bust open a group of about ten humans charged in. The group, of course, was led by my mother.

As soon as Danny saw mom enter he went invisible. Thankfully, he had been positioned in a corner of the room where mom hadn't looked right away so she didn't know he was in the room.

"Kids, where is the ghost? We have decided that 'Dark Danny' cannot be allowed to run free- now I know you would all like to see the best in him but deep down he is nothing but an evil manifestation of post-human consciousness and he _must _be detained! Where is he?!"

"He's not here Ms. F." Tucker said with a slight shake to his voice.

"Don't you lie to me, young man! I know you kids are hiding him somewhere. Come out, spook!" The rest of the humans with her voiced their approval and demanded that Phantom come out.

Danny, ever the peace-keeping hero, appeared floating in the corner of the room, saying, "If you want me to leave, I will. Let's just not fight ok? Remember that this isn't you- there are side effects to the- oh my _God_, Mr. Ferone?"

Me, Tucker and Valerie all asked, "What!?" at the same time.

Sure enough, in the back of the crowd of humans, Mr. Ferone was standing there with a frown on his face. The other humans turned around and gave him a questioning glare, and he simply shrugged.

"I'm well known with kids. Maybe I taught him before he died." Mr. Ferone said.

As soon as all the humans attention was off of him, he winked in Danny's general direction. Danny smirked back.

"Don't play games with us, _Phantom_. We know if we let you go that you'll just come back invisibly. We weren't born yesterday." Mom spat.

"Listen, Ms. Fenton, I know you don't like me but you have to grow up and get past that if we're going to get everyone out of here. Could you try to not be a hindrance for just an hour long drive?" Danny asked with an irritated tone.

"I will do whatever I have to do to protect the humans on board from your wrath." She glared at him.

"Fine, if it makes you feel better, glare at me the whole way home, I don't care. We have to leave, though, because I assume that the ectoplasmic atmosphere is only making the side effects worse and I don't need to have to deal with that. Now if all of you can find a place to be out of the way, that would be great." Danny hopped out of the air. He walked right past the humans with a smugness that was probably driving Mom crazy and plopped down in the drivers' seat.

I gave my brother an inconspicuous pat on the shoulder for handling that so well before taking a seat next to him.

"Ohhhh no! Not happening, Jasmine!" Before I knew what was happening Mom was pulling me out of the seat next to Danny and placing me as far away from him as she possibly could.

I groaned. This was going to be a long flight.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

When Mom moved Jazz, I couldn't help but feel a bit sad. I can't believe my own mother hates me _that much_. I pushed it to the back of my mind. Now was not the time to be unfocused.

I pushed a button and the front window snapped open, making the humans jump slightly. I stuck my fingers between my teeth and let out a high pitched whistle. I could hear Wulf howl, his way of acknowledging my call. Moments later he bounded through the treeline of the clearing.

I called out to him in Esperanto to open the portal.

Wulf's paw glowed for a moment before he slashed the air and the portal opened. He made it larger than usual so the ship would fit through, thankfully the ship was designed to fit through narrow spaces.

As soon as the portal was open to it's full width, I hit the gas and we flew forward towards the portal.

"WAIT!"

At that, I slammed on the brake, literally inches in front of the portal.

My eyes wide, I looked back to the source. Valerie.

The Huntresses visor was down so I couldn't clearly see her, but her voice had sounded panicked. I saw her breathe a sigh of relief.

"The class. We almost forgot the class." She said in total disbelief.

There was dead silence for at least sixty seconds.

Then Tucker and I burst into hysterical laughter.

"Oh- oh my God we almost forgot the class in the Gh-Ghost Zone!" Tucked said through laughing fits.

Valerie chuckled at this as well.

I sobered up and opened the front window again. I called out to Wulf in English. "Go ahead and close it up, Wulf! We just remembered another stop we have to make. I'll call you when we're ready!"

"Wait a minute, what class?" A human man asked, puzzled.

"You have kids going to Casper high?" Tucker asked.

"Yea, my daughter's a sophomore. Star Raymond."

"She's here." I said with a sigh. "She's here, along with everyone else that went on that trip. And somehow, we almost forgot them right here on this island in the middle of the Infinite Realms."

There were a few moments of silence. Then, the large man who appeared to be Star's father let out a cry of rage and he lunged at me.

I was too shocked by the surprise attack that I didn't even go intangible.

He grabbed me by the front of my hazmat and shoved me against a wall. I gasped slightly when the wind was knocked out of me. I winced- not in pain, but because I saw my mom's eyes widen.

"Dammit," I cursed under my breath.

"Hey, wait…" Mom said with a curious twinkle in her eye. She pulled the man off of me before pinning me to the wall by my neck. Thankfully, I didn't need oxygen as a ghost.

For just a few moments, nothing happened. Mom just stood there, and I just stood there. After those few moments, I felt her fingers shift around so that they were positioned differently on my neck. After another few moments she gasped and stepped away. It was only then that I realized what my mother had done.

She'd checked for a pulse; and she'd found one.

"Maddie, what is it?" A woman asked with a glare at me.

"He has _lungs. _He has a _heartbeat._ What the hell is going on here, ghost!?" She spat at me.

I took a moment to answer that. I wanted to say something that would distract her from facts like what I was and put her on a different track. I had to use this to my advantage.

Thankfully, I knew just how.

"Why would I tell you _anything_ about my weaknesses?" I asked with a smirk.

In my Mom's mind, the only thing that takes precedence over her scientific curiosity is her predatorial streak. She was more a hunter than a scientist.

Her expression turned unreadable. At this, I grinned. I knew it had worked. When she looks at me, she sees a ghost that somehow relies on a human anatomy to survive. That can be considered a weakness.

I was out of the woods; for now at least.

I pushed past my mother and sat back into the driver's seat. I started up the engine and the craft lifted. Tucker plopped into the seat next to mine and laughed.

"Dude, you _so _weren't kidding about those side effects. Mean. Violent. Mood swings.." We looked back at the humans to see most of them smiling and chatting, whereas before they were violent and grouchy. The change was so fast that it was almost comical. Mr. Ferone was camping out at the back of the room, clearly trying to absorb as much information as he could from the other humans while they chatted.

I grinned. "Ok, lets go get the class…"

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**George's P.O.V. (that snarky dude that kept bugging Tucker earlier- one of the freed humans)**

We were all just herded aboard like a bunch of sheep then left to our own devices. There were about eighty of us in this large room we'd been led to- about ten of us had gone off to confront the teenagers. The rest of us had opted to stay here.

I was just sitting on a couch in the room, absorbing my surroundings. This ship we were in was pretty cool. There was fancy, high-tech gear everywhere. Lots of the things aboard the ship were the same pink as our suit things are. It was a bit unnerving, but it wasn't the strangest thing in the world; especially considering our past few days. I had been at Casper high the day it had all started.

I was picking up my son, who was a senior. He just needed a ride to his football game. The Ghost Alarms went off. We all thought it was just the Box Ghost or something until we noticed the pink shadows flying around the hallways. There was chaos. Everyone was screaming. I saw that biker ghost race through the halls, but no one was really paying attention to him. Everyone was looking at the devil-like ghost with the unnerving eyes, and suddenly I wasn't even in control of my own body. Everyone was separated from their loved ones. The only things I really remember are the facts that the leader gave us. He never really told me anything. Other people, though, were given specific ghosts to hunt down or to take down if you see them.

Anyways. It was hell.

Now, the 'Teens Upstairs' as they'd been dubbed, just expected us to sit around and do nothing until we got home.

I paused for a moment, then grumbled 'As if.' I stood up and walked right past everyone and right out the doors. Three of my friends had seen me leave and followed me.

"Sooo, George. What exactly are we looking for?" My friend Paul asked as we walked through the halls, opening what doors we could. A few were locked, so we just skipped by those ones.

After about ten minutes of looking around, we came across a room that we heard some talking inside. We opened the door a crack and saw all the humans that had left earlier, just lounging around and talking. I scoffed and shut the door.

"Figures. We were rotting in that other room for like half an hour with eighty other humans while they had their own private room." Another friend, Alex, commented dryly. The rest of us just nodded our agreement.

We went back to looking around the ship and checking all the doors. It wasn't long before we found another interesting room.

I went up to a door on my right and tried the knob. It appeared to be locked. A couple of doors earlier had seemed locked but were just jammed, so I tried a bit harder and pushed more rigorously. The door made a fair amount of noise, so we almost didn't hear the whimper from the inside. Thankfully, the last member of our group, Max, had shockingly good hearing.

"Woah, wait-" He said as we were about to move on. He made more noise with the door and this time, the frightened whimper was loud enough for us all to hear.

"Woah. Guys, we gotta get this door open." I said with a bit of urgency in my tone. "On three?"

The others nodded, and we all positioned ourselves parallel to the door.

"One.." I started.

"Two…"

Three!"

We all bodychecked the door with all our might and it popped off the hinges.

We weren't really prepared for what we saw inside the room.

On the floor, propped up against each other, were two men. Their eyes were bright pink and filled with fear. Their wrists were zip-tied and one of them had dried up blood matting his hair.

Me and my boys stood in complete shock at the scene in front of us.

The two seemed to relax slightly when they saw us- apparently they were expecting someone else.

Paul, ever the doctor, ran up to them and checked to see if they were overly harmed.

"They seem fine- whoever did this apparently wasn't trying to really harm them." He paused and looked at the pair curiously. "What is with their eyes? I've never seen eyes like that on anyone."

"Yea you have, man." Alex said darkly. "These guys are drones." He glared at the two.

The rest of us thought back to our time under the mind control. Alex was right.

"So, what are we supposed to do?" I asked.

"Well, you can start by telling me what you're doing breaking a couple of drones out of their cell." A new voice said from the entryway.

We all froze. After a few seconds I turned slowly to the doorway, careful not to make any sudden movements.

Danny Phantom stood in the broken-down-doorway with a frown.

The two drones whimpered and trembled.

Paul scowled at the drones' reaction to Phantom. "Why are they so scared of you? What did you do to them?"

Phantom smirked. "They aren't scared of me. Their master is. Its an imprint from the mind control. I didn't do anything to them." He paused for a moment. "Well, the bloody one I lost my cool a bit. I just knocked him out and he started bleeding. I _did_ stop the bleeding if it makes you feel any better. I'm not heartless." He paused, and chuckled. "Well, I guess I don't actually have a heart anymore but still. You knew what I meant."

"'Lost your cool.'" Max scoffed.

"He's alive isn't he?" Phantom asked with an eyebrow raised.

I chuckled. "So what, as long as they're alive it's ok to attack a defenseless human?"

"I never said that. In case you forgot, Georgey, I haven't really been entirely myself lately. Sorry if I've been a bit grouchy." Phantom smirked. He mockingly turned to the drones. "And to you, good citizens, I formally apologize for the behavior of my demon."

"How did you know we were here?" Alex asked, looking slightly bewildered.

Phantom smiled. "You guys triggered my silent alarm." He walked over to the door a pointed out a small sheet of ice covering the doorframe.

"Ice..?"

"I when you broke my ice covering the door, my cyrokinesis flared. I came to make sure it wasn't the drones escaping."

"Why haven't you brought the drones to the rest of the humans to see if anyone recognized them?" I asked.

He looked from us to the drones. With a frown, he ushered us out of the room and made a new door out of ice.

"Walk with me," He said. He started walking back in the direction of the main human room, and we followed closely behind. "The drones, the minute they saw you, alerted their master and turned on a mini camera. The Leader saw that entire scene as it happened. While the drones were alone, the cameras were off. If you hadn't all barged in there, we could have used this ship for a surprise attack. Now, this ship has been marked and the Leader knows we're using it. He will also try to hack us and regain control. We have to move fast."

We approached the room we'd seen earlier with all the humans in it. Phantom threw the door open.

Immediately, all eyes were on us.

"Danny, what happened?" Tucker asked Phantom.

"What are you doing here? You were supposed to stay with the others." Maddie scowled at me.

"Maddie, not important. Tuck, we've been marked." Phantom said, taking control immediately. He ignored the shocked gasp from his friend and the humans demanding answers. "Red, how close are we?"

"About ten minutes." replied the Red Huntress.

The Ghost pinched the bridge of his nose. "Ok. Thats not fast enough. I'm going to go out there and push."

"Wait, Danny what do you mean we've-" she stopped when she saw that he'd already left.

"They know we're here," I said. "they're tracking the ship. Because of me they know what ship we're on. They're on their way."

"What!?" Half the people in the room asked. Before I could say anything more, the ship lurched forward. A few people almost fell over. We looked out the window and we were going much faster than before. The Island below us was a blur we were going so fast.

Red suddenly yelled, and the ship slowed to a stop. I assumed that it was a radio of some sorts. The Huntress opened the front window and was about to hop out, when to the surprise of all the adults, James Ferone offered to accompany her. She cheerfully accepted and he hopped aboard her hovercraft. The two flew down into the forest.

We all just sat for a few minutes waiting. Phantom phased back into the room, confident in the huntresses abilities to get the class out of the 'log cabin from hell' as she'd dubbed it.

We were starting to get worried when we saw her signal, a small light blinking in the trees.

Phantom lowered the craft so that he and Red could easily load the humans all aboard, and then he went to join Red. They were out of sight for a few minutes..

Just when we thought for sure that they'd been caught they appeared, each carrying around five humans.

They had to make three trips, but eventually everyone was aboard. We were about to summon Wulf for the second time when a very large hole was blasted into our engine.

The ship didn't last long after that.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

Frostbite, King of the Far Frozen, led his people through the darkest part of the Ghost Zone. The women held on to their children for dear life while the men formed a protective circle around the group.

Frostbite's second, Hailstone, approached his Leader at the front of the group.

Frostbite sighed. "You feel it as well, my good friend?"

"I do," Hailstone replied solemnly. "The Far Frozen has melted."

The two yeti's mourned the loss of their home in silence while they walked. The silence didn't last long, though.

"We much find shelter as soon as possible, sir. The youngs are warming, despite our best efforts." The second-in-command reported.

"We will be safe as soon as we reach Dora's Kingdom."

"Sir, all due respect, I don't think that's an option right now. They need a cool shelter right now."

Frostbite stopped and took in their surroundings. They walked on a lone path, no caves of lairs in sight. Having an idea, Frostbite stepped to the edge of the path. He used his ice powers to created a dome attached to the bottom of the path. He made a slide that led into the dome. He ushered the women in first, the let the men go down. He and Hailstone were the last to enter their makeshift cave.

After they were all comfortable, he dissolved the slide so it wouldn't be noticed by any potential threats.

All the yetis curled up together to try to keep cool and prayed that they wouldn't be found.


	14. Crash and Burn

**Decided to give you guys another little chapter because I made you all wait so long for the last one. **

**I do not own Danny Phantom**

**Chapter 14**

**Danny P.O.V. **

You know that sinking feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when something isn't going to go your way?

I usually get that feeling at least once a day. Skulker has a new weapon and he's in a bad mood. I'm going to fail this math test because boxy comes back every two seconds. The lunch menu changed.

I get this feeling all the time; it isn't at all uncommon.

Today was different. As oppose to the sinking feeling I've come to accept, the bad feeling feels more like a train running me over. Probably because the things that have happened so far today have felt that much worse than usual.

Just before a bus full of humans is kidnapped, I feel like a train ran me down.

Imagine how I felt just before a super sized specter speeder with over a hundred humans in it started hurtling towards land.

In essence, it sucked.

I looked around me. I was in the room that most of the humans were staying in.

Everyone was screaming. We all felt gravity shift slightly.

When I saw Lily, I snapped back to attention. She was the youngest human here, she was about seven. I'd helped her onto the ship Apparently, in the Leader's book, just old enough to be a soldier.

Her parents weren't here. I had left her with a group of adults that looked trustworthy, but now they were nowhere in sight. She was bawling.

When I saw her alone, I immediately I snapped out of the spooked state I'd been in. I flew out of the ship to assess the damage while we were still airborne. There was no way I could repair anything before the ship hit the ground. So, instead, I raced down to the forest.

There was no clearing close enough for me to ease the ship into, so I would have to make my own. I blasted trees left and right and as fast as I could, which was extremely fast. After only ten seconds I had a relatively large clearing with just a few fallen trees laying around. I looked up to see the ship dangerously close to me. I quickly reached up and caught it the best I could.

I was actually an ok job of easing the ship down until we were shot a second time. The imbalance of air going through the ship made me drop it. I frantically tried to regain my hold on the ship- until I saw Lily again.

This time, she and about twenty other humans weren't on the ship. They had just fallen out of the brand new hole in the ship.

I flew towards the little girl and grabbed her around the waist. She spun around, tears in her eyes and screaming until she saw me. She grabbed on to me and held on for dear life.

I flew around, catching the humans as they fell. It reminded me of a scene out of _Iron Man 3_. I made several trips from the sky to the ground at over two hundred mph, but finally the humans who had fallen out were safe back on the island. I saw Valerie out of the corner of my eye trying to get as many humans from the ship to the ground as she could.

I knew that I should try to do the same, but I knew we'd never get them all in time. So, instead of trying to get them all out, I would try to slow the ships descent so Valerie had more time.

I observed and evaluated the trajectory of the ship's descent in under five seconds- then flew off to the nose of the vessel. I grabbed the front end of the ship and tried to hold it

up from there.

Thankfully, the ships descent did in fact slow. At the rate the ship was falling, Valerie had about twenty more seconds before the ship hit the ground. I watched her for a signal of some sort to let me know the ship was clear. I watched her clear the main room and the

control room. She flew out with the last group and saluted me on her way to the ground so I could rest easily. Relieved, I let go of the ship that had felt heavier and heavier every second that held it.

As soon as I let go, I remembered the drones were still in there.

_Good time to remind me, brain._ I thought to myself miserably.

I flew down to the ship that was rapidly descending and I flew inside intangibly. I flew to the room with the ice-door and flew right through, trying to get out of the ship as soon as possible.

The drones, of course, were trembling in the corner of the room. I grabbed one of each of their arms and I pulled them out through the wall. Just as I pulled them out, the ship crashed right outside the clearing I'd made. The ship went up in green, ectoplasmic flames.

Oh well.

I landed right inside the clearing that I'd made, and the rest of the humans were there as well. They looked at the green flames with a look of pure shock. Once I landed, I flew inside the minds of the drones and knocked them out.

Everyone was so blown away by what had just happened that they didn't question me about it.

No one had spoken a single word since the first shot. There had only been screaming, crying and panic. Now, there was only relief.

I let myself collapse with a tired groan. That ship weighed way more than anything I've ever had to lift.

I lay on the ground for about two minutes. At one point during that time, Lily came over to me, ignoring the humans who silently discouraged her, and she plopped down on the ground next to me. I noticed that she was still silently crying. I smiled rubbed her shoulder calmingly.

Lily was the first to break the silence. "You were so brave, Danny."

I chuckled. "So were you, Lily. Who else can fall out of a ship and still be the strong girl you are?"

She giggled and gave me a hug. I stroked her shiny black hair comfortingly.

"Phantom." I heard from behind me.

I tilted my head back to see Mom standing over me.

"What, here to tell me that I'm too much of a menace to comfort this poor kid who's here all alone? Oh, I sincerely apologize for trying to be a good-"

"Not now, Phantom. Save your witty banter. We've got a group of humans missing."

I shot up, being mindful of Lily and paled.

"Do we have any idea where they could be?"

Valerie walked up. Her visor still blocked my view of her face but I could tell she was upset. Her voice cracked when she spoke. "Paulina, Dash and Kwan. I- I think they were aboard the ship when it-" she choked up, not even able to finish her sentence.

I shot up from my spot on the ground, handed Lily off to Valerie and flew at at least two hundred and twenty miles per hour towards the wreckage.

I flew threw fire, ignoring the burning sensation and flew threw the halls of the broken down ship. There was green flame everywhere. I almost didn't see the three teens through the smog from all the burning ectoplasm.

I kneeled next to the first teen that I saw; Paulina. I grabbed her wrist and felt for a pulse. It was there, but it was weak. I quickly picked her up, knowing perfectly well that if she had any internal injuries that this could make it worse- but right then I just needed to get them out of the ship.

Next I found Kwan, who appeared to be groaning so I knew he was alive.

Finally, after another whole minute of searching, I found Dash. He was trapped under a wall that had apparently collapsed. I pulled all the rubble off of him and checked for a pulse.

I panicked when I couldn't find one.

I thought back to all the emergency first aid that Sam had taught me. I couldn't keep him alive with CPR in here, the ceiling could cave in. The fastest thing would be an AED for shocking, but I don't think I'll be able to find-

Then I had an idea. Maybe…

I rubbed my hands together, adding a little jolt of ectoplasm, and I watched in fascination when my hands crackled with ecto-electricity.

"It'll have to do," I said with a sigh.

I charged my palms again, and pressed each hand to a spot on his body where a shock pad would have gone.

Dash's body convulsed, and his eyes flew open. I was shocked for a moment when his eyes flashed ectoplasmic green, but it disappeared.

Maybe it was a reflection of the fire around us.

Maybe.

"Dash?" I asked.

He blinked and shook his head, as if trying to clear it. When he looked up and saw his hero, he beamed. "Phantom! I knew you would save us, dude!"

I hid a slight eye-roll. "Later, Dash. We have to get out of here. Hop on my back."

Dash did as he was told and hopped onto my back piggy-back style. I grabbed Dash and Paulina and I flew us through the wall. I had us back at the clearing in under thirty seconds.

George's friend, Paul I think, ran over to us as soon as we touched down.

"I'm a doctor. Let me see them."

I explained that Paulina's pulse was quiet, but there and that Kwan appeared to be relatively stable. I told him how I'd restarted Dash's heart.

At the last part, he frowned slightly. "That was a risky move- but it seemed to have worked."

He checked over Paulina first, then Kwan and lastly Dash. He deemed them all mostly besides a few burns and a break or two each. He diagnosed Dash's heart stopping as shock from the wall falling on him.

I breathed a sigh of relief and helped the doctor treat the burns. I paused my work on an arm burn on Kwan, "Ms. Fenton!" I called my mother over. She stepped forward from the group.

"Maddie can you take a look at them? I'm a bit concerned. There was a lot of ectoplasmic smog in there. They have ectoplasm burns. I even had to start Dash's heart with ecto-electricity. I think you should look them over."

Mom didn't even speak. She just ran to look over the burns, which I suppose in her experience was probably the most worrisome.

After all; she didn't know that after a blast of ecto-electricity her own son had acquired a ghost half.

Thankfully, she went to Kwan first. His burns were the worst.

Dash was sitting off to the side, getting his leg splinted by Paul. I walked over to them, and careful not to get in the doctors way, I sat next to Dash.

He grinned with a slight wince. "Thanks for the save."

"No problem," I said absently. "Do you mind if I just check you over real quick? I don't know if the doctor told you this but your heart stopped- I had to restart it with ecto-electricity. I just want to make sure there weren't any side effects."

"Dude! That's awesome! Does this mean I might get like, super powers or something? That would be the coolest thing ever!"

I winced. That was exactly what I hoped _wasn't _the case.

I put my hand to his heart and let the ectoplasm in my cells flow to my hand. This was the same method that I used to feel for Clockworks core when he was knocked out.

"Danny!" Tucker called. He was approaching us. His stare went from happy to extremely confused when he saw what I was doing.

"Danny, wha-"

Suddenly I got such a powerful electric shock that I cried out. It took me a few moments to realize what had happened.

Dash had shocked me. More accurately, Dash's _core_ had shocked me. It wasn't developed like mine was, but it was there. It had shocked me in defence.

For a few seconds I could only stare in open mouthed shock at Dash.

When I snapped out of it, I realized that everyone in the entire clearing (everyone conscious, of course,) was staring at me.

Dash's voice shook. "I assume that _that _was not supposed to happen."

I could only shake my head in silence.


	15. Halfa?

**_Longest chapter yet! :D YEY! Enjoy!_**

**I do not own Danny Phantom. **

**Chapter 15**

**Dash P.O.V. **

The way Phantom stared at me was super nerve wracking. His expression was like a mix of shocked, curious and nervous.

"Uhhh, dude? Can you at least tell me what's wrong?" I asked, my voice shaking.

I looked around. Everyone who had been staring was now going back to ignoring us. Phantom seemed to have noticed the same thing, and he seemed to relax a bit.

He asked Paul if he could give us a minute. The doctor gave him one last questioning glance but he went back to the group. Phantom motioned Foley to come closer, to my confusion. Why bring a geek like him over?

Phantom sighed and turned to Foley.

"He's got a core."

Foley's eyes widened. "Does that mean..?"

"Maybe.."

My hero cursed under his breath.

Foley chuckled. "Sam would kick your ass right now for getting us in this situation."

Phantom chuckled humorlessly. "If she were around she wouldn't have let this happen at all."

I just sat there silent, expecting one of them to explain. They just sat in silence.

"You guys?" I urged. "You should probably tell me what's going on."

The ghost nodded and sighed. "So, basically, when I restarted your heart, I accidentally created an underdeveloped ghost core inside you. In other words, I put some ghost DNA into your system."

"So, will I be able to fly and shoot ectoblasts an stuff?" I asked excitedly.

"I don't know. I also don't know if this is hurting your human system. I mean, I basically brought you back from the dead with ghost energy. This could be serious- it could be killing you."

I paled. "But that's not for sure, right? You don't know for sure?"

"No. In fact, I'm almost sure that it won't. I think it will make you a halfa unless we work fast."

"Halfa?"

"A dangerous hybrid between ghosts and humans. There are only three in the world and they are some of the most powerful ghosts ever."

"Cool!"

"No, trust me, you don't want that life. Walking the line between life and death for all eternity? It sucks. It's lonely. Trust me, you're better off a human." Phantom's eyes wandered. His expression looked slightly haunted.

"Are you..?"

Phantom seemed to shake himself out of the stupor he'd been in. "No. No I'm not."

"By that haunted look on your face, I don't know if I believe you." I snorted.

Danny chuckled. "You're more perceptive than people give you credit for."

I just raised an eyebrow.

"Sorry, but I barely know you Dash. I don't really plan on revealing all my deep dark secrets to you in the near future."

Suddenly, Foley spoke up, "There," he said holding out his PDA. There were some charts on the screen. Phantom looked closely at them. "These are the numbers from when the second halfa was made. This is the amount of electricity it took to make a full, stable half ghost. So, we measure your built in defibrillator and compare the two numbers."

Phantom nodded. He started rubbing his palms together quickly and his palms started to glow a bright green. Meanwhile, Tucker's PDA ejected a T shaped rod. Tucker pressed a few buttons and gave Phantom the ok.

"Clear," Phantom said with a smirk. Tucker dropped the device and Danny caught it by the rod, one hand touching each side of the T. The charge passed through the rod.

The PDA whirred. I was concerned for a moment that the thing might blow up, but it settled.

Tucker picked up the device and studied the screen intently. Phantom went and looked over his shoulder at it. The two started speaking in a language that I didn't understand. After a minute or two of their conversation I recognized it as the same language that Fenton had spoken to the Observants in when we all found each other. (Chapter 7)

"_**The amount I shocked him with was way less than the amount I was shocked with. Maybe he won't even have any side effects"**_ Phantom pointed out on the screen.

"_**Yea, maybe if we're lucky. Also, when you were made half ghost the shock transformed you immediately. I guess its a possibility that he might have a few basic ghostly abilities but unless he ever goes ghost I don't see any reason for concern-"**_

Suddenly I felt sharp pain in the back of my skull. It grew more and more painful for a few seconds and I almost cried out in pain. I could hear Phantom yelling my name, but it wasn't really registering through the pain. After just a few more seconds, the headache cut out entirely.

"Oh crap. Dash? Dash can you hear me?" Phantom was calling.

I nodded, sighing with relief. "_**It's gone.."**_ I grumbled.

Tucker looked at Phantom with a fearful expression. Phantom looked concerned as well.

They both just stared.

"_**What?"**_ I asked, their looks starting to make me nervous.

"Are you even hearing yourself dude?" Foley asked.

"_**What do you mean?"**_

"Tucker." Phantom said shakily, sounding less confident than I've ever heard him before. "Could this be a side effect?"

"_**Could what be a side effect? The migraine?"**_

"No, the fact that every word you've spoken since the migraine has been in Ghost."

"WHAT!?" I yelled in english. When I realized that my first language was back I sighed with relief.

Phantom looked from the group to Foley and I. "Dash, we have to get back to the group. They're starting to give us weird looks. Dash I'm very serious about this though- you can't tell _anyone_ about halfas, ok? If Maddie Fenton found out, I-" he paused. His expression was unreadable. "She would hunt down every half ghost on earth and she would not stop until each of their heads is mounted on her wall. This is really important, Dash. You could be one of them. You say a word, and you go down just as hard as the others, got it?"

"Why do you care? I thought you were a ghost hunter."

"Well for one, I care about humans, no matter how much ghost DNA they possess. Two, I'm going to be the king of the Ghost Zone one day. I care about Ghosts just as much as I care about humans. So yea, I send ghosts back to here when they wander into our world, but that's only to prevent humans from waging war on ghosts. A war would be catastrophic. Millions dead on both sides. I just do what I can to help both sides."

I let all this information sink in, and Phantom left me and Foley alone. Foley apparently didn't want to be alone with me so he finished the splint on my leg as quickly as he could and helped me to my feet.

I hissed with pain when I put weight on my leg. The doctor guy, Paul, had told me that I had breaks in at least four different places.

Not that I would ever admit it to anyone, but I was _really_ in pain. I was scared.

As much as I didn't want to say anything, I really needed someone to talk to about this, and Foley seemed to know what was going on.

'Foley..?" I started slowly. He nodded in acknowledgement. "What does this mean for me? I have a football scholarship man, I have a whole life ahead of me. What do I do if this whole ghost thing is permanent?"

The techno geek was silent. We walked for a little while longer, but just before we reached the group, he spoke up. "I know one of them. The halfas. He's young. He didn't deserve what happened to him. He pushes through it, though. He tries not to let it get in the way of his life. It does, sometimes, but he still tries. He works hard. Frankly, he's my hero. My advice to you, try to be the kind of guy who has these amazing abilities, but uses them for the benefit of others. Be the hero of guys like me. Don't be the bully that everybody fears. As popular as you are, lots of people don't like you. Lot's of people can't stand to be in the same room with you. Most people, even."

"Wow, Foley. That was deep." I said jokingly.

"Trust me. After you've seen what these powers have done to some people as opposed to others, you'll be having those deep moments yourself."

On that note, we rejoined the group.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

My mother is a difficult person to please; especially when you're on her bad side.

"How are we supposed to get back to the mainland without a ship? Why on earth did you let the ship be ruined like this? What kind of hero are you to let three teenagers get so severely injured?! Speaking of being reckless with teenagers, why did you let my son go back to the human realm _alone_? He's a teenager for God's sake!"

This incessant yelling had been going on ever since I'd returned from my meeting with Dash. So far, I haven't even said a word in defense for fear that she might straight out attack me. The last thing we need right now is a physical fight.

I suppressed a groan when my mother had finally stopped yelling for a second, but then launched into yet another tirade of screeching and accusations. Even some of the other humans had started to look annoyed.

"And another thing! None of this would have happened at all if you hadn't ordered your ghost, pet.. _thing_ to come aboard the ship with us so we could have gone through the portal as soon as we had the class! Did you think your plan through even _once?_"

"Ok, you know what, _stop it._ If Wulf had even approached the ship you would have _shot _him! You have been complaining non-stop about having to trust a ghost, but have you ever even considered my point of view? _No!_ Because you think I'm just some brainless, obsession-ridden monster that doesn't understand what it's like to _have_ a point of view! Let me just spell this situation out for you- I am a fifteen year old ghost who _died _last year, and when I realized what that I had these new powers I decided to use them to help people. I have put my afterlife on the line to help humans not have to suffer through what I did when I died. The only thing that I have received in return is 'Public Ghost Enemy #1'. Now, the lady who has been on my ass more than any other being, ghost or human, is trapped in the Ghost Zone along with another hundred or so disapproving humans and I want to help get you all out. I am helping humans out of my own free will right now because it is the right thing to do. I have done nothing to harm a human on purpose this entire time! I am trying to get us out of here alive, which you can't do alone because you have never been to the Ghost Zone in your entire life! If it weren't for me and my friends, you would all just be mindless drones right now and you wouldn't be able to do a single thing about it! Now, please, if you wouldn't mind helping us all out by being the leader that these humans need you to be, that would be _great._"

"Danny? _**You ok, man?**_" Tucker asked from behind me, slipping into Ghost so our conversation could be a bit more private. I had been so busy ranting that I didn't even noticed his return.

"_**Yea, she just drives me crazy.. She needs to get over herself and try to help instead of constantly criticizing."**_

Dash, who'd been leaning on Tucker while he walked on the splint, looked like he was concentrating. "_**Hello..?" **_He paused for a moment, then grinned. "_**Sweet. I speak Ghost."**_

I chuckled. "_**I guess you do. But hey, can you go check on your friends for us? I haven't checked on them yet but I think I have more pressing matters here."**_ I said this while discreetly motioning to my mother.

Dash rolled his eyes. He let go of Tucker and hobbled over to Paulina and Kwan, who seemed to be awake now. Paul had just finished checking over the two when Dash arrived.

I snapped back to attention when Maddie finally got over the shock from my outburst.

"...Fine." She said with a growl. "Fine, I will back off until we get back to the Human World, but if you try anything.."

"Let's just quit while we're ahead, ok?" I said jokingly.

I may have been imagining it, but I thought I saw a ghost of a smile on her face before she went off to order some humans around.

When Maddie was gone, Valerie approached me. She was still holding Lily's hand for me. As soon as the little girl saw me, though, she let go of Valerie and raced over to me. I smiled warmly and she jumped into my arms. Valerie smirked.

I lifted Lily so I could stand at my full height when I spoke to my friends. She just wrapped her arms around my neck and relaxed.

"Look at you." Valerie said jokingly. "You would make a hell of a Dad."

I smirked. "I doubt that I'll have time for a kid anytime soon."

"Never say never," She said with a grin. "So what was up with Dash? What did he do to make you cry out like that?"

It took me a minute to remember what she was talking about with her second question. "Oh! Um- have you been studying the ghost Language? It's a great way to make conversation private."

"I know quite a bit- but I'm not fluent."

"Well, we might as well try. _**Dash has a ghost core.**_"

"WHAT?!" She shrieked. A few heads turned, but then they just decided to ignore us entirely. Lily, who seemed to be sleeping on my shoulder, shifted at the sudden noise.

"Did you get that?"

"I hope to whatever God is listening that I didn't. A ghost core? _Dash!?_" She whispered the last part.

I nodded.

"_**Is he a halfa?"**_ She asked with a look of dread.

"_**I think that he might have a few ghost abilities, but I don't think he is a full halfa. The side effects might even wear off in time-"**_

We were cut off by a very high pitched screech. I spun around so quickly that I almost dropped Lily.

Paulina was staring at the spot where Dash used to be.

I immediately knew what had happened. Dash had gone invisible.

I cursed under my breath, and thinking fast I went invisible as well and bolted over to where Dash was.

I put my hand on his shoulder and did what I would normally do to transfer my invisibility over to him, and then I went visible.

Dash, thankfully, followed suit. I mentally applauded myself, I had just forced Dash to become visible. For anyone who was watching, it had looked like I had made Dash invisible as a joke.

Dash sighed in relief and sent me a grateful glance.

Unfortunately, now I had to deal with Paulina and Kwan.

"Ghost boy!" Paulina said with a voice that sort of mixed between flirtatious and accusing. "That scared meee!"

I almost gagged. At my pained expression, Lily giggled.

"Oh, hey!" I turned to the girl in my arms. "I forgot you were there, kiddo!"

"Why do you look sick to your tummy whenever she talks?" Lily asked with another giggle.

I blushed, and Paulina looked like she was about to explode in total fury. Tucker and Valerie, who had just walked up, laughed hysterically at what the seven year old had said.

"Why are you holding a kid?" Kwan asked.

Ignoring him, I leaned over to Dash and said in ghost, "_**We need to talk."**_

He nodded. Turning to his friends, he said "I gotta go find that doctor guy. I'll see you two later."

Me (with Lily), Tucker, Val and Dash all walked off so that we were separated from the group, but not enough that anyone questioned us.

I started. "Lily? Can you keep a secret for us, kiddo?"

She nodded.

"This whole talk is going to be a secret, ok? You can't tell anyone about anything we say."

She nodded again, looking even more excited.

"Ok," I turned to my friends. "What on _earth_ are we going to do about Dash's out of control powers?"

"Well, judging by how long it took y- the _other_ halfas-" Tucker started, but he was cut off by Dash.

"Ok, first of all can you just be honest? I already believe Phantom is a half ghost, you all might as well admit it."

I sighed. "I'm not-"

Dash glared at me.

"You aren't letting this go, are you?"

"No."

Dash and I were engaged in a glaring contest for at least two minutes.

I sighed. "Fine. I'm a halfa. But, we are _not_ discussing this right now."

Dash did a small happy dance and Lily just looked confused.

I sighed. I should have tried to leave Lily with someone else, but honestly I don't think she would have agreed to stay away from me. So, I picked her up off of my shoulder and set her on the ground, then I crouched next to her.

I made my expression warm, but serious. "Lily, a halfa is a human that has ghost powers. This is very serious, you can't tell a single soul. Not your mommy, not your daddy and none of your friends. This could get me in a lot of trouble if anyone else besides you found out, ok?"

She looked a bit less excited to be in on the big secret now that she wasn't allowed to tell anyone, but she still looked pleased. "I promise Danny, I won't tell anybody ever!"

I smiled. "Ok." Then I turned to Dash. "So, it takes months to have any kind of control, and we don't even know if you're going to have these powers for months. I do have a couple of tips, though. Using these powers is a completely psychological thing. So, to avoid going invisible by mistake, for example, just imagine yourself there. Picture everyone seeing you."

I moved so that I was in position where I was blocking Dash from view.

"Now imagine being invisible. Imagine being just, gone…? I'm really not entirely sure how to word it."

Dash raised an eyebrow.

"Hey! Cut me some slack. I've never had to actually teach someone how to be a ghost." I smirked. "Just try it. If you can do it my accident, then you can do it on purpose."

The jock looked slightly nervous, but I didn't call him on it. I just gave him a minute to think. He exhaled, sort of dramatically, and then he disappeared.

Lily cheered and clapped enthusiastically. Tuck, Val and I all just grinned and gave him a discreet thumbs up as to not alert the group of our activities.

Dash suddenly reappeared, and was grinning like crazy. "That's _amazing!_ Does it always feel this awesome to use powers?"

"Depends on the situation. We'll discuss that later too. For now, we should probably get back to the group. We should find cover- who knows what the psycho that shot us down has in store."

"Thanks, Phantom. Way to jinx us." Valerie snorted.

"Lay off, Gray." Dash glared at Valerie.

"Whoa! Back up. He knows?" Tucker asked.

Valerie sighed. "Yea. A ghost tiger jumped us and the entire class found out."

"It was _sick_ when she fought it off! She was all like- FSHEEWW" He imitated Valerie flinging a blade around. "It was so cool, dude! Then she like, threw these kick-ass exploding bouncy ball things and-"

Valerie slapped a hand over Dash's mouth. "Shut up."

Tucker laughed, and imitating Dash's voice (badly) he said, "Val, you're like, so cool with your swords and your blades and stuff.."

Valerie sent her boyfriend the mother of all death glares. Dash glared at Tucker as well with an indignant snort. Lily, not really understanding what was going on, just giggled.

I watched the exchange with an amused glance. I wasn't really part of the conversation; I was more focussed on watching the treeline of my man-made clearing. I didn't want anything sneaking up on us. I reached out with my senses, which scanned the forest around us quickly. I didn't sense any ghosts, but I wasn't sure about humans. Humans weren't as easy to track in the Ghost Zone because here, they are the ghosts. This is one of the reasons why the Leader's plan to attack ghosts with humans is so ingenious. We can't defend ourselves from them in our own home.

I broke away from my thought when I felt sharp pain from the side of my head. For a moment I panicked, automatically assuming we were being attacked. I spun around, looking in every direction for the source of the attack. I was confused when Tucker started laughing so hard he couldn't even stand.

Valerie, who'd been arguing with Dash, looked over in confusion and started laughing just as hard. Dash, as much as he seemed to want to laugh, tried to control himself in front of his hero.

I finally realized what was going on when I looked over at Lily

She was holding a large clump of my stark white hair in her palm.

I had freaked out just because Lily had accidently pulled out some of my hair.

Lily, seeing the others laughing, figured she hadn't done anything too wrong and laughed as well.

The shock was just starting to wear off, and even I was starting to chuckle at the whole thing.

For a few moments, we all felt better. We felt less stressed and this adorable little girl was making us all smile.

Things were great until Lily went absolutely still in my arms. Everyone sent a slightly concerned look in her direction.

She didn't seem hurt or anything, she was just staring at the clump of my hair that she had in her palm.

I watched in mute horror while the snow white looks suddenly changed.

It turned jet black. While Dash watched.

Had Dash never learned about halfas, I could have blown this off somehow.

But he had.

He stared at the black hair excitedly, probably guessing what this was.

Then he stared at me. He stared for a minute or so, taking in all my features. I tried to keep my expression as blank as I could, but I was panicking like crazy on the inside. Tuck and Val seemed to be freaking out as well. None of is moved a muscle.

A few moments of staring longer, I started to relax, thinking I was in the clear and that Dash was still clueless.

Then, suddenly, Dash paled.

His excited look faded. It started to look more and more upset. I could see the wheels turning in his mind. After a few more seconds he looked downright distraught.

"Oh. My. _God._"

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Sam's P.O.V.**

I lay around in my cage, feeling more sympathy than ever for zoo animals. I was, for one, bored out of my mind. Secondly, I was worried about my friends and family. Thirdly, _I was bored out of my freaking mind_. Did I say bored twice? Damn right I did. Would it kill this guy to give me a crossword puzzle or something?

For the past _three hours_ I'd been singing every song I knew, even ones I hated, to keep myself sane, but my repertoire wasn't endless.

"_I want to hide the truth_

_I want to shelter you_

_but with the beast inside_

_there's no where we can hide_

_No matter what we breed_

_we still are made of greed_

_This is my kingdom come_

_this is my kingdom come_

_When you feel my heat_

_look into my eyes_

_It's where my demons hide_

_It's where my demons hide_

_Don't get too close_

_It's dark inside_

_It's where my demons hide,_

_It's where my demons hi-"_

I was cut off as the door swung open. I knew it must be a drone. He had sent a different drone every day to tend to my meals and bathroom trips. It was about time for another meal.

"Breakfast." a very familiar voice said.

I shot up from my spot in the cage.

My _mother_ walked up to my cage with a plate of eggs. Her eyes were bright, hot pink.

"Pamela Grace Manson!" I said immediately, but I tried to keep my voice down in case we had company.

My mother stumbled, breaking out of the mind spell.

I laughed. "Fancy seeing you here."

She blinked, then looked up at me. Her eyes welled up and she hugged me through the bars of the cage.

"Oh, Sammy. Thank God.." She sobbed.

Not that I would ever admit it to anyone, I shed a few tears myself.

"Mom. Mom, it's ok. I need you to calm down so we can get out of here."

Mom slowly let go of me and relaxed a bit.

"Ok, Mom, we have to move fast, so listen to me very closely. You have to go out there right now, and you have to find the key to the cage. I can maybe get us out from here. Do not make eye contact with anyone. Try not to let people see your eyes at all, if that's possible. People will see that your free if they notice your eyes. If you can'f find the key after twenty minutes, come back here. Got it?"

She nodded and started walking out of the room.

"Wait!" I called after her. She looked at me questioningly.

I sighed. "Your walk is all wrong. You aren't your own person, you're a drone. Walk like it."

She continued to walk, looking more submissive and more mindless.

I gave her the traditional 'ok' sign as she walked out the door.

I continued humming. I got through a couple more songs when, to my immense relief, My Mom walked through to door. She pulled a key out of her pocket.

I grinned in pride for my mom and she looked extremely relieved as well.

"Did you see any cameras?" I asked her. She nodded, then burst into giggles.

"What?" I asked suspiciously.

"You won't believe this- we're in the Diskell's building!" She burst into laughter.

My jaw hit the ground. The Diskell family is very close to ours. Mom visits this building at least three times a week for lunch wih the owners. I guess she hadn't noticed earlier because of the mindspell.

She knew these halls like the back of her hand.

This was really lucky, I didn't know the building very well. I believe I could have gotten us out, but Mom will be able to get us out faster.

I laughed with her. The Leader was a bad luck magnet.

My mom, sobering up, hurried to open the cage door. As soon as I was out, we hurried to the door and Mom peeked out.

"Ok. Let's go!" she said. She was about to take off in one direction, but I stopped her.

"Can you get us out as easily if we make a quick stop at the kitchen first?"

"I suppose, Sammy. Why?"

"I'm getting us a plan B."

With that, we raced off in the other direction towards the kitchen.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Once we reached to kitchen, I quickly peeked my head in the door to make sure the room was clear. Unfortunately, there was a drone in there cleaning dishes. I sighed internally.

I saw a frying pan on the counter, and I creeped into the room, motioning for my mom to stand guard.

I grabbed the pan off the counter as quietly as I could, and then whacked the drone over the head with it. The woman dropped like a stone. My mom looked in to see what the noise was. Needless to say she sent a very disaproving glare in my direction when she saw the unconscious lady on the floor at my feet.

I ignored it and grabbed the sharpest knife I could find in the kitchen.

"What's that for?" Mom asked when I left the room.

I hid the knife in the hem of the black cargo pants I was wearing, careful to place in in a way that I could still run without fear of being stabbed by accident. "Hopefully, you won't need to find out. Now hurry up and lead us out of here."

Mom sent a worried glance in my direction, but she started leading us down the hallway nonetheless. She led us down to the first floor and to the back door. We had made it the entire way without detection.

I had to give my mom credit, there.

We were so close.

"Leaving so soon, ladies?" An echoey voice called out from behind us.

I pulled out the knife.


	16. Out of Control

**Here's the next chapter! Review to tell me if you like it and review to tell me if there's anything you want to be added!**

**Enjoy!**

**Chapter 16**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

"Dash?" I waved my hand in front of his face jokingly, trying to lighten the mood. "Baxter. Dude. Snap out of it."

"I can't believe it." He said dazedly.

Still clinging to the hope that _just maybe_ he didn't figure it out, I asked, "Can't believe what?"

Then, Dash did the last thing I expected him to do.

He punched me in the face. I heard a sick crack in my jaw. I stumbled slightly, but I've taken _way_ worse punches. I wouldn't have even been annoyed if he hadn't missed Lily by less than an inch.

Dash stood over me, trying to look menacing. He had a few inches on me, but I wasn't even nervous. After you've stared down Pariah Dark, not much scares you.

Dash stole me from my thoughts "Why the _hell_ did you not tell me!? I'm your biggest fan and you let me pick on you in the hallways as if you were just some nerd or something?! _Not cool!_"

He went to hit me again, and Tucker tried to stop him by grabbing his arm. Dash was held off for a few seconds, but I gave Tuck a look that basically said _Stand down, bro. I got this._

Tucker rolled his eyes and stood back. Dash immediately charged, his fist flying for my face.

As much as I didn't want to give the humans any reason to mistrust me at all, I had been waiting for this moment since freshman year. I smirked, and with Lily still in my arms, I ducked under the punch. I grabbed his fist with my free hand and spun around so that I was behind him, pulling his arm behind him as well. As Dash tried to sidestep away from me I flung my leg forward to trip him. It worked, and he lost his balance. Dash fell forward, and before he could get back up I had him pinned to the ground. I heard some shouting coming from the group, so I had to plead my case _fast_.

"I didn't tell you because if I had you would have gone from bullying me to bullying some other kid who didn't deserve it. Frankly, I'd rather you bully someone who can take a punch than someone who can't. Think about that." I stepped off of Dash. Lily, who I hadn't let go of the whole time, was applauding me.

A few strong, angry looking humans raced over to us. My mom was among them.

"What is going on, here?" A large man asked while glaring at me.

I gave the man a small grin, "Baxter, here, just wanted a few tips for the upcoming wrestling season. I thought I would teach him one of my personal favorites for self-defense."

I looked over at Dash, who was still on the ground. He glared at me.

I knew by the expression on his face that he wasn't going to play along.

I had mere seconds to act.

He turned to the humans. With a smirk, he said. "Danny Phantom is -"

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Dash's P.O.V.**

"Danny Phantom is-" _only half ghost._ I was shocked when my lips didn't form the rest of the sentence. From my own lips, the words came out as, "one of the best fighters around! I figured that he had a couple interesting moves up his sleeve that I could use."

My hand reached up to the ghost and he pulled me up to my feet.

_No, _I reminded myself. _Not a ghost._

_Fenton._

It took me a couple more seconds to realize what was happening.

He'd overshadowed me halfway through my sentence! He must have been using that duplication thing that Manson mentioned earlier.

_Damn him_, I thought miserably.

_Sorry about this, Dash._ I heard Fenton say in my mind. Oh, great. Now he can hear my thoughts too.

Phantom came up with a couple more lies to calm down the humans, and they eventually retreated back to the group. The humans that had come to check out our activities were now leaving. With every step they took, I felt more and more helpless.

_Dash, really. I _am _sorry. You don't know how Mom gets about ghosts, she would kill me! Literally!_

_Get the hell out of me, Fenton!_

_So what, you can call them back? Did you not hear what I just said?!_

_You deserve whatever they do to you. _I growled back. _You lied to everyone. You lied to me. I worshiped you like you were some kind of _god _and you turn out to be just some loser. Also, you lied about the existence of an entire species and you didn't tell a single person?! You're a coward and you deserve whatever punishment they dish out._

_Maybe I do. But, I'm going to continue to keep the secret anyways because I won't put the lives of the other halfas at risk. Danielle is a sweet kid, she's only three years old! For one of those years, she was in a lab, being forced grow into a teen. She's a toddler living in a thirteen-year old's body, Dash. All of that, on top of being half ghost. Does she deserve to be killed just for existing? Vlad, the first halfa, is an evil asshole and a total fruitloop who has a weird thing for my mom, but I don't really want to be the cause of his death. I won't have his blood on my hands no matter how tempting it can get sometimes. What about yourself, Dash? What if this happens to you too? What if you develop a full blown ghost half? They would hunt you as soon as Vlad, Danni and I are all dead and dissected. They would _murder _all of us in cold blood!_

I was silent. I still sent all the negative vibes I could in Fenton's direction.

Danny scoffed in my mind, taking the hint. _Take a few minutes to calm down. We'll talk when you can think past how pissed off you are and can actually see some reason._

With that, there was silence.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Danny's P.O.V.**

I left the duplicate in charge of Dash's body, but he had strict orders to not talk to the jock at all.

I sighed when I was back in my own body and not visiting Dash's.

Valerie snorted, looking at Dash, who was standing next to me with a blank expression. "Judging by your solemn expression, I guess he didn't take being overshadowed too well."

Dash's eyes flashed green, and the duplicate spoke. "He says, 'Who would?'." As soon as the duplicate stopped talking, Dash's eyes returned to their normal color.

I glared. "I told you not to talk to him."

The duplicate grinned mischievously. Once again, while he spoke, Dash's eyes glowed. "I didn't. I just quoted him."

Tucker rolled his eyes. "While he's still freaked out and going on a 'spill-all-Danny's-secrets' rampage, he doesn't get an opinion."

"I agree." Valerie snarled, glaring at Dash.

"He says that this is kidnapping. It's illegal." The duplicate relayed once again, despite our glares.

"So is murder," I said, with an irritated glare.

Dash seemed to be silent after that.

"Ok, guys," Tucker spoke up. "We should probably to get back to the other humans. They're starting to look a bit restless. We should move everyone out of the clearing until we figure out our next course of action. We're sitting ducks out here." As an afterthought, he turned to the duplicate. "Other Danny, _not _talk to anyone if you can avoid it. Your eyes go ghost green whenever you speak."

The duplicates (or Dash's, whatever.) eyes widened. He kept his mouth shut after that.

When we reached the group, everyone's eyes were immediately on us.

"Are you finally ready to come up with a legitimate plan to get us out of here? Or do you need to go off and have yet another private conversation with a bunch of teenagers?" My mother said as she approached our group.

Lily tensed in my arms.

I guess my mom makes her nervous.

That makes two of us.

I cleared my throat. "Uh, yeah, I'm good to come up with a plan. Let's do it elsewhere, though. We're sitting ducks out here. We could go find a cave or something..?"

"Do you remember which direction the shots came from? We should probably avoid being shot at again at if that's possible."

"North-east." Tucker piped up. He pointed off to the right. "The shots came from that way."

"Ok, so we just go in the opposite direction?" Valerie asked.

"To be frank, I don't think it matters what direction we go in." My duplicate said through Dash's body. He kept his eyes mostly closed as he spoke to hide the glowing. As much as we wanted to scold him for speaking at all, we were curious about what he had to say. He grinned when we didn't say anything to oppose his speaking, and he continued. "I think that they have us surrounded. They can't attack us out in the open because Skulker and the other ghosts would come running. The Leader would have told them to wait until we were out of the clearing."

"Why is that?" My mother asked. "Why would the ghost's come running if we were attacked? "

"Because of him." The duplicate pointed at me. "They would come running because he is the future king of the Ghost Zone and everyone protects him."

I looked over at my duplicate incredulously. I thought over to him- _Dude! How on earth is telling them that a good idea?!_

_Calm down, bro. I got this._ I could hear Dash himself yelling at me in the background when I spoke to the duplicate, but the copy was doing a good job of tuning the angry jock out. I was pretty proud of myself about this duplicate. It was easier to maintain the clone than last time I used duplication because this time I was in ghost mode. Also, this time, the duplicate was capable of thinking too, which was pretty cool. I was definitely getting better.

"Are you, now?" My mom asked me with a suspicious glare.

I rubbed the back of my neck in embarrassment. Everyone was looking at me for an answer.

"Um, yea.." I said awkwardly.

Everyone was silent until Valerie, thankfully, broke the silence and carried on with the conversation as if it had never been interrupted.

"So what do you suggest we do?" Valerie asked my duplicate.

"Call Wulf. Tell him to be careful coming in, then we have him send groups of people back to the Human World."

My mom looked thoughtful, and she went off to discuss the idea with some of the other humans.

I turned to my duplicate. "Dude, that's a really good idea. How did you come up with that?"

The duplicate chuckled. "Wanna know something funny? I didn't come up with it. _He _did."

"So you stole his idea? Way to help us get on his good side.." Tucker said with a chuckle.

"I didn't steal it. He told me to say that."

I was so shocked that I almost dropped the seven-year-old in my arms. Lily squeaked in fear when she felt my grip loosen and held onto my neck for dear life. I chuckled and pulled her back into my arms. My friends grinned warmly at the interaction.

"I can't tell if that's progress or not," I said with a grin. I was having trouble believing that, for one, Dash had come up with such a great idea and two that he'd been willing to share it with us.

Perhaps he was just trying to win our trust.

I was contemplating the possibilities when my mom rejoined us. "The others are on board. They all have one question though- how are we going to get Wulf in if we do turn out to be surrounded?"

I thought about this for a second. She was right. I wasn't sure how Wulf would get in. The Pinks would get suspicious for sure if they heard me whistle for him, and they could easily shoot Wulf as soon as they see him.

"Phantom could make a duplicate." Came Dash's snarky voice. I looked at the duplicate with wide eyes and a slightly panicked expression.

_WHAT? Dude you know I can't make more than one at a time yet!_

'…_..' _My duplicate dropped into guilty silence. When he finally continued he sounded a bit nervous. _Well, Plasmius can do more than that and you're just as strong as he is. Just try..?_

_Plasmius can't Wail. As strong as he is, he just doesn't have that power. Same goes both ways._

_Ok! I'm sorry, it wasn't me! Dash came through for a sec by accident, I-_

I could hear Dash in the background, despite my duplicates efforts to silence him. _HAH! Suck on that (PROFANITY TOO INTENSE FOR THIS FIC)_

I groaned internally. _Great. Just great._

"Can you do that?" Mom asked me, breaking me away from my thoughts.

"I- I um, haven't actually mastered that power yet…" I said awkwardly.

"You did it earlier." A new voice came into the conversation.

William Lancer walked over to our group, followed by four students from our class: Emily, Matt, Mikey, and Kwan.

"Yea, Manson said earlier that he'd just mastered it recently," Kwan said.

Wow. Should have known revealing that would come back to bite me in the ass.

Thanks, Universe. Glad to know you have my back.

I sighed, "I guess I can try, but I can't promise good results…"

Everyone looked at me expectantly. My friends looked nervous, my mother and Lancer looked curious and my classmates looked excited.

I handed Lily to Valerie. I didn't know what would happen if I tried to duplicate while I was touching someone, and I wasn't about to use the seven-year-old as my guinea pig.

As soon as Lily was out of my hands, I tried to create a copy. I could feel the process starting, but I could also feel an obvious lack of power that I was spending on the other duplicate. I had to stop when I felt that, even if I did succeed in making a duplicate, that it would probably turn out to be human.

My friend could see me stop trying and they looked concerned.

With an irritated tone in my voice, I said "Well, I tri-"

Before I could even finish my sentence, whatever God was watching finally took some pity on me.

"Hey, stranger!" A female voice called out from behind me.

I turned around to see a female, thirteen-year-old me. I grinned widely.

"Is that your duplicate? If so, that's pretty good. You're only a chromosome off." My mother said jokingly.

Danielle raised an eyebrow, but she rolled with it. "Hi! I'm Danielle, but call me Dani!"

"Not that isn't a pleasure to meet you, but I think I'll call you Danielle. It will save me a lot of confusion." Mr. Lancer said with a slight smile.a couple of adults in the crowd chuckled.

Dani smiled back.

I looked around, making sure everyone bought it. My eyes landed on my duplicate.

He seemed to be holding back his hysterical laughter.

I raised an eyebrow. He looked like he tried to cover up his laughter more, but I didn't let it go.

_What? _I asked.

_I- He- um…_

I sent my duplicate a mental glare.

_Dash thinks Dani is hot._

… I was completely shocked.

After the shock wore off, I was too furious to speak. I was too furious to move. I was seconds away from attacking when my mom called me over.

As much as I wanted to either A, beat the shit out of Dash, or B, go talk to my cousin/clone (who was over talking to my other friends,) I knew ignoring my mom was the most counter-productive thing I could possibly do right now. I need her to not hate me as possible.

So, as much as I didn't want to, I walked over to Mom, motioning for my duplicate to follow.

"So," My mother said, eyeing Dani. "She seems to be fitting in fine. Who knew copies had so much brain function…"

"Uhh, yeah. So what did you want to talk about?" I asked, quickly changing the subject.

Mom raised an eyebrow but answered anyway. "We want you to try again with the duplicate. She looks a bit.. young. She doesn't look like she's at the same level of power as you."

"I dunno- she and I should have the same abilities…" I was cut off by my mother calling Dani over.

I paled tremendously.

Dani raised an eyebrow but walked over. She saw my nervous glance and seemed pale a bit as well.

"Ok, Danielle." My mother started, trying to sound gentle. "Can you form some ice for us?"

Dani looked over at me with a slightly panicked expression. She didn't have her ice power yet.

I winked.

Trusting me to help her out, Dani raised her hand. I focussed on her hand and an ice crystal formed there. I grinned in satisfaction.

Suddenly, some random guy from the crowd around us stepped forward with a glare in my direction. "Maddie! Phantom's eyes glowed blue when the ice formed on _her_ hand!"

"Oh, really?" Mom glared at me as well.

I groaned internally. Tattletale.

Dani tried to cover for us, "That happens sometimes when a ghost in the surrounding area is using its powers..?"

"I've never seen any evidence of that. I don't believe what I can't see." Mom said, turning her dirty look on, Dani.

"Fine," I said, catching my mom's attention and taking the heat off of Dani. "I messed up the duplication. Everyone was staring and it stressed me out. I'll make a new one, but I'm going somewhere private to do it." I stomped off, but before I did I told my duplicate to follow me as soon as no one was looking, and I told Dani to come too.

I walked out of the clearing and into the trees. I walked for about five minutes until I was sure that no wandering humans would hear us. Dash and Dani showed up about two minutes later.

"Ok. So here's the plan. Duplicate me is going to have to make an appearance and Dani is going to have to disappear, so the answer is simple. You two will switch places."

Duplicate chuckled. "You have no idea how much Dash is opposed to the idea of having a girl inside him."

"I'm not really a fan of that idea either," Dani said with an annoyed expression.

"Well, the other option is that I go back out there and explain to them that I'm too weak to create a duplicate. Thanks to Dash that isn't really an option, though, now. So what do you guys suggest."

Dani sighed in exasperation. "Fine. How long do I have to be in there?"

"Until Duplicate, here, finds Wulf. Maybe you can even bring some back up to be our defense while we transport the humans back." I suggested to him.

The duplicate shrugged. "Sure, whatever." He lay back on the ground.

I already knew what he was thinking.

I sat down on top of him, pinning his arms to his sides. I clamped my hand over his mouth in case Dash decided to call for help while he was temporarily free.

"Ok, are we ready?" I asked Dani and the duplicate. Duplicate nodded with a muffled 'yep'.

"Let's do it," Dani said with a sly grin.

Everything next happened really fast. Duplicate flew out of Dash, and just before Dani flew in to replace him, disaster struck.

Dash had been struggling since he'd been freed, trying with all his might to escape my grasp by force.

Then, at the worst possible moment, he mastered a new ghost power.

Intangibility.

Dash phased through me, narrowly avoiding Dani who had almost overshadowed him.

I was so shocked when Dash escaped my grasp that I fell to the ground right where he had been. It took me almost three seconds to recover from the shock.

Three seconds too long.

Dash's scream for help echoed through to forest.

**Next chapter we see what Sam is up to! Review with ideas!**

**(I might give a shout out to anyone who gets it right :D)**

**Also, review if you liked this chapter!**


	17. Oops

_**!VERY IMPORTANT PLEEEEEASE READ RIGHT NOW!**_

**So, summer is almost here. I've been falling behind at school because I've been writing this instead of doing homework since, like, January. My bad. XD**

**My parents will **_**murder**_ **me if my final mark is under 80%, soooo don't be acting all confused if I don't update again within the next month or so. I have to bring my mark up **_**a lot**_**. I might not even update again until near the end of June. **

**Sorry, but I promise that I'll be back with tons of updates during the summer! **

**(BTW, none of you are allowed to be mad cause until now I updated pretty much weekly. Thats pretty darn good considering some authors take like friggin two years to update. XD Also, writing 10 page long chapters every week isn't easy. I'll get back to the story as soon as finals are over.)**

**NO COMPLATIN (complaining/hating *sWooZie*)**

**And now, presenting….**

**Chapter 17! (holy crap, 17 already? XD Wras only planning on going for 15)**

**Enjoy!**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Sam's P.O.V.**

I spun around, knife in hand.

There stood the Leader himself. He was glaring at us and aiming a human gun at Mom with deadly accuracy.

Thankfully, I had my plan B at the ready. I trembled, slightly.

The ghost chuckled darkly when he saw Sams knife. "What did you think you were going to do with that? Are you going to stab me?"

"Nope." I said with a fake smirk. I moved the knife so that it was poised directly over my left thigh, hoping that he wouldn't notice how much I was shaking. "If you do anything I don't like, though, I'm going to stab _me._"

My mother, of course, immediately began shrieking objections.

The Leader looked surprised, then confused.

Then he paled.

He knew who perfectly well who Phantom would blame if I was injured.

Mom tried to take the knife from me, but years of ghost hunting had left me much stronger than her. I easily held her back. I was lucky that it was so easy to hold her off- I was using most of my energy keeping a poker face anyway. I couldn't have the Leader call my bluff.

"So now what?" He asked with a snort, the gun still trained on my mom. "Neither of us can move. So what do we do?"

"Oh, me and my mom can move just fine. In fact, we _will_ move and you will stay right here. You will do nothing about us leaving or you can face my boyfriends wrath. Make your choice."

The Leader glared, but lowered his weapon.

Smart choice.

I quickly turned to my mother. "Go!"

She quickly bolted towards the door.

I heard the click of the safety being turned off just a moment too late.

Acting entirely on instinct, I threw myself in front of my mother, and seconds later I felt white hot pain in my shoulder.

I stumbled, but I kept moving. I kept Mom moving as well and we ran out of the building. I ran us into an alley, and finding a drain into a sewer I guided my mom into it.

Once we were down in the sewer, I breathed a sigh of relief. Danny, Tucker and I had set up a safe spot down here for situations just like this. I guided my sobbing mother through the sewers until we reached a gap in the wall of the tunnel. It was small, and we had to crawl to get through it, but the room itself was a good size. Danny and Tucker had set up battery operated lights down here, so we had light. It was a good thing, too, because I needed that light to clean out the wound on my shoulder. I found the medicine kit that we'd stashed down here and sat down on the damp ground.

I had started cleaning out my wound to the best of my ability (it was hard to reach, but I didn't trust mom to do it right so I sucked it up) when my mom stopped crying for long enough to tell me my left leg was bleeding too.

Surprised, I looked down at my leg. I groaned when I saw that she was right. I must have accidentally stuck myself with the knife when I took the bullet for my mother. I tore off the leg of my pants so I could get a better look at the wound.

Damn. It's bigger than I thought it'd be.

I was still cleaning out my two wounds when my mother seemed to calm herself.

"Sammy?" She asked.

I grunted in acknowledgment, more focussed on my wounds than I was on her.

"Why didn't he brainwash you too?"

I paused my work to think of an answer that wouldn't reveal more than I wanted it to.

"Well," I started. "It's a bit of a long story. I'm important to the only person that can stop him, so he kidnapped me so I could act as a security blanket. He didn't brainwash me out of fear that he would be punished even more severely if he got caught. That's also what I tried to do with the knife, he knew that he would be in even more trouble if I was hurt. Injured, I'm actually more of a threat than I was before. Does that kind of make sense?"

"I suppose. Who is he? The person who can stop that monster?" She paused for a few seconds. "..and, why did you call him your boyfriend?"

..Oops.

_**IF YOU DIDN'T READ THE AUTHORS NOTE AT THE BEGINNING YOU'RE GONNA BE PRETTY DAMN CONFUSED WHEN I SUDDENLY STOP POSTING NEW CHAPTERS SO GO READ IT RIGHT NOW BEFORE CONTINUING!**_

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Leader's P.O.V.**

I kept replaying the scene over and over in my mind.

The moment that sealed my fate.

I missed my shot by mere inches. Inches.

I had thought fast. I just needed to hit the older woman, then Manson would have stopped to help her. This would have given me time to call some drones to restrain them and get that knife from the girl.

Now, I could run all I want. I could run to the other end of the earth. I could hide in the Ghost Zone.

But he would find me. He said it himself in the message he sent me through the drone he captured.

It is rumored that a Ghost King is made one with the Infinite Realms and that he could find an ecto-signature anywhere in the Zone. That is what gave me the idea to run to the human world as soon as I'd teleported away. I wasn't sure that he would have been able to find me, but I couldn't take that chance.

He was different than the past kings, though. He's a halfa. For all anyone knows, he could have the power to trace beings in the human world as well because of his human half.

Now that I hurt his friend, he would make the rest of my afterlife absolute hell.

I was still standing in the doorway Manson had escaped out of. I couldn't bring myself to move. The drones I had called when I took the shot had arrived a few moments ago and were trying to snap me out of the stupor I was trapped in, but I ignored them.

I was too busy focussing on how I was going to fight back.

Suddenly, I had an idea..

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

"Go! Take the littles! Run!" Frostbite yelled to a group of women as he shot three or four more ice blasts at the group of pinks. The women ran in the opposite direction, only to be blocked off my another group of humans under the mind-spell.

They had been so close. Dora's kingdom was under a day's walk away. They could make out the castle in the distance.

Hailstone barked orders to the men while Frostbite tried to clear a path for the women and the youngs.

There were too many.

The Leader approached, unnoticed by the overwhelmed yetis. He's decided to risk a visit to the Ghost Zone for this.

He powered up, and he pulled the same trick that he used on Clockwork and the observants.

While he couldn't fully control ghosts like he could humans, his suggestion was still a fairly powerful force. Enough to render them defenseless.

After mere moments, every yeti was unconscious.

The Leader smirked. "Take all of them. Every single one."

Manson was a good hostage for a while, but she was old news now.

Now, he had the entire population of the Far Frozen to hold over Phantom's head.

Now, he didn't have to worry about Phantom ever again.

**Review! If I get enough reviews I might have to make time for one more update before summer… *sly grin***


	18. Time's Up

**DONE SCHOOL :D YEY!**

**Thank you all for waiting! **

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

_**(One more quick note that I almost forgot- I'm on Instagram now at sourpopsicles15. I may or may not start posting sneak peeks of my stories on there every so often (; )**_

**Chapter 18**

**Third Person P.O.V.**

Dash stumbled into the clearing screaming. He immediately had the attention of all the humans.

Danny and his duplicate ran into the clearing after the hysterical jock, the duplicate shooting ectoplasmic blasts behind him. Danny meanwhile, motioned for all the humans to run in the opposite direction and yelled for them to 'go!'.

Dash looked back, confused. What was Fenton doing? He slowed down for a second while he turned around and Danielle caught him by surprise. She overshadowed the jock and kept running.

Danny sighed in relief when he saw Dash's eyes flash green before returning to their normal color. Now, time to work on damage control.

The group of humans heeded Danny's 'warning' and ran in the opposite direction. The all ran into the tree line, followed by the halfas. The latter was immediately attacked with questions from their human companions.

"We were attacked," Dani said, answering all of the humans' questions with an explanation. She panted theatrically through Dash's body. "I wanted to see Phantom use his separating power thingy, so I hid in the bushes where I could see him. Right after he finished a group of Pinks came out of nowhere and just attacked us!"

The humans seemed to be satisfied with her explanation and looked to Danny to tell them the next move. This was the first time they'd really gotten a good look at the new duplicate.

Their jaws hung open in amazement.

The Danny's chuckled at the reaction they'd gotten, but they both knew that they had to get moving. Now that they were out of the clearing, the Pinks would be free to attack because it would be harder for help to find the group.

"You guys can guess which one of us is which later," Danny started.

"For now, though," the duplicate continued, "Let's find some shelter."

"Everybody hold on to someone else," Danny called out to the group.

Everybody quickly separated into their chosen social groups to hold onto each other, and both Danny's sighed in exasperation. This might be a bit harder than they thought, considering all the social hierarchy.

Thankfully, with extensive encouragement from the two Danny's, the whole group was connected to one another after a minute or so. Danny and his duplicate strategically placed themselves on either side of the large group of humans, and Dani put herself in the middle. The three ghosts worked together to turn the whole group intangible. The humans all dropped through the ground, where they flew for a few minutes. Danny secretly prayed that Dash hadn't been right before about the Pinks having completely surrounded them. If that was true, they could all be in enormous trouble. The Pinks would have realized that the humans were underground as soon as his ectosignature passed beneath them, and would easily be able to track them.

After several minutes of flying, Danny and Danny 2.0 both agreed (they had talked about it in their shared mind) that one of them had to go above and find a cave or something to rest in for the night. Fake Danny agreed to go above, as his ectosignature isn't as obvious as Real Danny's. As soon as the duplicate let go of the group, Danny felt more strained. He had extra power from his title as Ghost Prince but holding almost a hundred humans in the air and intangible was still difficult. Having to maintain a duplicate at the same time was even more trying. Dani wanted to help more, but with all the humans around her she couldn't help do much besides help keep everyone intangible.

Danny almost collapsed with relief when he heard his duplicates voice in his mind.

"I found a cave, and the Pinks are nowhere in sight as of yet. Bring them up."

Danny was quick to comply and brought the humans back above ground. Fake Danny led the group towards the cave while Danny met back up with Tucker, Valerie and Jazz, who was holding Lily in her arms.

Danny grabbed the girl from his older sister and gave her a huge bear hug. He said, smiling, "Hey, kiddo! I haven't seen you in a while! How's Jazz been treating you?"

"Great, Danny! Ms. Ferone watched me for a while too- she was fun! I like Mr. Ferone pretty good; he's super nice and he makes lots of jokes. Jazzy is nice too but she doesn't make too much jokes."

Jazz snorted while Tucker, Valerie and I chuckled at her expense.

"I'm going to bring Lily back to the Ferones, You guys might need to be able to defend yourselves if the Pink army happens to stop by," Danny said while turning invisible and floating above the group. When he got up there, he stopped to look around. Spotting his target, he quickly flew over to the Ferone couple. They were standing apart from the group, partially hidden by a tree.

"James, just because Dash is acting strangely doesn't mean that it's Danny has anything to do with it."

"I'm not accusing him of anything bad, Anna, but I _do _believe that he has something- "

"I can't believe you're questioning him after all he's done for us!"

"I'm not! I'm just saying that maybe something happened that forced Danny to go to extreme lengths to keep the entire group from splitting apart and going crazy!" He said the sentence in a rushed tone so that he could get it all in before he was interrupted again.

Anna looked like she was about to angrily retort once again, but Danny interrupted.

"It's true, Anna." He said, turning visible next to them.

Anna jumped and clutched her chest in surprise When the boy appeared next to them. James just looked confused.

"What do you mean Danny?" He asked.

"Dash almost caused the group to collapse into a frenzy because he found out about me being his favorite form of misplaced aggression back at school. He wasn't happy that I didn't tell my 'biggest fan' the big secret. He tried to tell my mom, and you both know how she gets. She would have torn the group apart. It wouldn't have taken long for everyone to take sides and go crazy."

The two nodded knowingly.

"So why is Dash acting so different? Why isn't he hanging out with his friends and making stupid jokes about the nerds and such?"

"Remember that little girl, Dani?"

They nodded again.

"She wasn't a duplicate. She was a clone of me created in a lab. She just happened to have insanely good timing and extremely good luck for not getting shot on her way into the clearing. She pretended to be a copy that I'd just created on the spot. The reason I couldn't duplicate was because I already had an active duplicate, who was in control of Dash's body."

"So now we're accomplices to a kidnapping?" Mr. Ferone said jokingly.

"I guess. In our defense, though, if he wasn't such an ass we wouldn't have needed to kidnap him. He brought this on himself." Danny said while he handed Lily to Anna.

Danny smiled at the girl warmly. "Be good for Ms. Ferone, ok? Ill be back to check on you later."

"Mkay, Danny! Bye!" She replied with a wide grin.

Danny flew up to the front of the group where his duplicate was already starting to herd people into the cave he'd found. The cave was larger than it'd originally seemed, and the group had no trouble fitting inside the cave. Tucker, Val, Jazz and Danny (both of him) were the last ones outside the dark cave.

"One of us should probably keep watch, right?" Jazz asked.

"Yea, I'll do it. You guys head in and get some sleep. You all look exhausted." Danny said with a sigh.

"If you're staying out, so am I," said Tucker with a snort. "Besides, you look more tired than all of us put together."

"Yea, if anyone's sleeping it should be you." Valerie added.

Knowing his friends wouldn't let this go, Danny held up his hands in surrender. "Fine, fine. If you guys want to stay out, I won't stop you, but I'm staying out with you."

Danny looked over to his duplicate. Deciding that the extra hands weren't needed anymore, he re-absorbed it. Best to preserve as much energy as possible for the moment.

Danny walked to the entrance of the cave and propped himself up against the rock.

His friends all found spots of their own nearby, and they all watched the silent forest around them.

Danny slowly drifted off, falling asleep after only a few minutes of keeping watch.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Tucker's P.O.V.

I looked over at the others. Val was watching the forest to the right of the cave, and Jazz was watching to the left. Danny and I were sitting on either side of the caves entrance.

He had fallen asleep about an hour earlier. He was currently curled up in a ball on his side, facing away from me.

I had expected nothing less, the dude was like the living dead he was so tired.

It took me a few seconds to realize the pun I'd just made.

_Oh my God, I hang around Danny too much. _

I continued scanning the forest all around us for movement. I was the least tired out of all of us because I'd been able to sleep for an hour or so while they'd been in the ship, so I was watching the area twice as intently as the others.

It was for that reason that I noticed the red glow first.

I turned towards the glow in confusion, and saw that it's source was _Danny._

"Danny? Dude, are you ok?" I asked.

When my best friend looked back at me, my blood chilled.

His eyes were entirely blood red. He didn't even have irises anymore.

….Dark Danny.

None of us knew it at the time, but there was a reason for the demon's sudden appearance.

It had been exactly twenty-four hours since Danny had contacted the Leader through the drone.

"_You tell your Leader right now that if Sam is not back in my arms in under twenty-four hours that I will personally tear him apart molecule by molecule and he will be awake for every second of it. If she is in any way hurt, I will draw it out even further. The rest of his afterlife will be absolute hell. I will find him. If he doubts that I can, remind him that I am the halfa. I am the Ghost Prince. I am Danny Phantom and I will find him. Tell him that right now and I might let you live."_

The Leader's time was up, and the Demon Phantom had returned to make good of his promise.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Sam's P.O.V.**

"_Who is he? The person who can stop that monster?" Mom paused for a few seconds. "..and, why did you call him your boyfriend?"_

_..Oops._

I didn't reply, I just continued to clean out my wounds. The one on my leg stung, and it looked awfully deep. Unfortunately, the medicine kit that we'd stored here didn't have a needle in it for stitches. I would just have to bandage it as well as I could.

"Samantha?"

I was stolen from my thoughts by my Mom's voice.

With a sigh, I looked at her straight in the eyes and said, "My personal life should not be your main concern right now. We need to worry about finding the others."

My mother pouted. "Fine. Don't tell me about your 'boyfriend' if you don't want to, but who are the others?"

"The humans who aren't under the mind spell. When I was captured they were in the Ghost Zone, but they might have gotten here by now. We need to find a way to contact them without being tracked by the Leader."

"The Leader was the man who shot you, wasn't he?"

"I'd hardly call him a man, Mom. He's a ghost and yes, he was the one who shot me. He wasn't aiming for me, though, he was aiming to hit you. He knows that you're the weak link in our team, and that you would be easier to take down. He also knows that once you get taken down, I'll stop whatever I'm doing to try to help you. So the trick is to stop you from being taken down." I paused, and reached into the med kit for some bandages and anti-bacterials. I handed them to my mother. "I'm going to train you. Start by cleaning out and wrapping the wound on my shoulder- then we can start doing something useful."

"Shouldn't we try to find a doctor or something? The Leader couldn't have taken everyone."

"There may be a doctor out there, but these wounds need treatment right away. I'm not asking you to do anything hard like taking out the bullet, just clean the entry point." I snapped at her.

"The bullet is still inside you?!"

I stared at her in disbelief. I couldn't tell if she was still in shock or just seriously stupid.

Both, I assume.

"Yes, Mom, it is, but we don't have time to worry about that at the moment. Let's just do what we can so we can keep moving." I said as calmly as I could.

After that, we sat in silence for a bit. Mom worked on my shoulder while I worked on my leg. I winced as my mother's unpracticed fingers shook, accidentally hitting the wound sometimes by accident.

It took us about 10 minutes to finish up. When we were done, I grabbed a few rations from a hole in the wall, and threw them in a spare bag. I also grabbed a pen and paper, and wrote a quick note in case Danny and the others stopped by here.

"_If found, please deliver to Danny Fenton, Tucker Foley, Jasmine Fenton or Valerie Grey._

_Hey guys, it's Sam. I escaped the Leader's base, which is located at the Diskell Building, by the way, and I have my Mom with me. I found her back at the Base. We plan to get outside the Amity Park borders and find a place to camp out from there. We'll most likely be east of Amity, unless we run into trouble and have to go someplace else. I just have to get my mom somewhere safe, and then I'll come back to this spot._

_Best of luck._

I put the note right on top of the food rations so that no one could miss it, then I turned to my mother. She in the same spot that she'd sat while cleaning out my shoulderwas hugging her knees, staring into nothing. As annoying as Mom could be, I still cared about her, and I felt guilty that I hadn't been there for her sooner.

I sat down next to her and put a comforting arm around her shoulders. "So, Mom, for now, we are just going to focus on getting outside Amity Park, ok? I think that he is waiting until.. that guy that can stop him.. isn't an issue anymore before he starts attacking the rest of the world. We should be safe out there for now."

Mom nodded and stood up. She didn't say a word as she crawled out of the room through the small tunnel.

My mother is _never_ quiet; so things must be really bad.

I sighed, and crawled after her.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

**Tucker's P.O.V.**

"Danny. Danny, calm down." I spoke loud enough that Jazz and Valerie looked over in confusion. They both froze as well at the sight of Danny's eyes.

Danny stood up slowly, not acknowledging that I'd said anything.

His voice carried into the cave that some of the people on the inside woke up at the sound of his voice. The first one to approach the cave entrance was, of course, Maddie Fenton.

As she approached Danny, we all made it painfully obvious that Danny wasn't himself. We were trembling, our faces twisted with fear. She froze when she realized what was wrong.

"Dark Danny." Was all she said.

Danny spun around. When Maddie saw his eyes, hers widened to the size of saucers.

"Ahh, Maddie. How nice to see you again. How's your boy, Danny, been?" He asked with a snarky grin.

"Don't talk about my son." She said, evening out her expression. To everyone around, Maddie's tone sounded like the calm before the storm.

"Danny?" Asked a new voice from in the cave.

"No! Lily, honey, come back!" Ms. Ferones voice called from farther inside the cave.

Ignoring the older woman, Lily ran forward until she was almost within arm's reach of Danny.

"Danny? Is that you?" The young girl's voice quivered.

Smirking, Danny's Demon squatted down to Lily's level. "I'm sorry, sweetie, but Danny isn't here right now. I'm his buddy, Dark Danny." He spoke with mock innocence.

"What do you mean he's not there?" Lily said, surprising us all by glaring at the demon.

"..Gone." Dark Danny smiled maliciously, his teeth sharpening into fangs as he spoke the word.

Lily was silent for a few seconds, but then her normally blue eyes suddenly glowed bright green, and her glare transformed into an innocent smile. "Sorry, Baby-Pop, but that ain't gonna cut it."

Lily jumped at Danny, blasting him with ecto-blasts, then tackling him with surprising force. Caught off guard, Dark Danny stumbled. As he fell back, he ran straight into Skulker. The robot ghost had appeared out of nowhere right behind where Danny had been standing.

As soon as Danny was within range, Skulker jumped out of his helmet and overshadowed him.

The halfa collapsed.

"Danny!" Multiple voices called out in panic, both in and outside the cave.

Groaning, Danny sat up, and Skulkers tiny body was ejected from his head. Reacting quickly, Danny caught it.

Then Danny opened his eyes, and instead of being entirely red, they were now entirely green.

"Sidekicks of whelp, you are all extremely fortunate that Ember and me were in the area." Said Skulker through Danny's body.

"What the hell, Skulker?! Give me back Phantom's body!" Dark Danny's voice yelled from Skulkers' tiny body.

Skulker glared. "You are trying to stain the name of the Ghost Prince, you miserable demon, and I will not stand for it! Leave the Prince's mind _at once_!"

Valerie, who was still standing by Jazz, couldn't help but giggle. She leaned over to Danny's older sister, whispering, "What happened to the nickname 'Whelp'? I remember a time when Skulker refused to even acknowledge Danny's royal status- he would deliberately interrupt and start yelling about his latest prey whenever someone brought it up."

"Its funny to think about now." Jazz added with a grin as the two watched Skulker violently shake his other body. He and Lily were both screaming at him to leave their Prince alone.

I grinned, and walked closer to the pair. Skulker and Lily looked up at me with a glare, angry that they'd been interrupted.

"I'm pretty sure Danny wouldn't appreciate you taking over Lily, Ember. He's pretty protective of her." I said with a smirk.

Ember was quick to leave the little girls body after that.

Lily collapsed, and I quickly went to help her up. I picked up the little girl, trying to copy Danny's way of holding her as much as I could.

I looked up at Skulker, "Is there any way to take out the demon by force?"

"We could, but we would need the Observants' help. From what I've heard, they are in the ghost coma."

"Yea, they are. Are you sure that's the only way?"

"Of course not. I'm not all-knowing and I don't know anyone who is. I'm afraid that for now, we're stuck with the demon." Skulker said, glaring at his own tiny body that was still being occupied by Dark Danny.

"Guys, I hear something.." Valerie suddenly called out to us.

We all fell silent, and sure enough we could hear some bushes rustling in the distance. We all turned in the direction in which we'd heard the noise, and we could see lights flashing through the trees. They looked like flashlights.

"Could that possibly be anyone besides the Pinks?" Jazz asked with a panicky voice.

Suddenly, an intense beam of light shot out of the trees and hit me right in the chest.

I cried out as I flew back with the beam, only stopping when I hit a tree.

My vision went fuzzy after my head hit the trunk.

I could make out Jazz and Valerie running up to me.

I turned to Jazz, "Nope. It's the Pinks."

After that, I blacked out.

**Would have gone further because this chapter wasn't really huge, but I have people waiting for me to finish up so I have to go. I'll have another chapter up within the next three days to make up for it :)**

**Thanks- **

**sourpopsicles**


	19. Clockwork's Mistake

**Hey guys!**

**SORRY FOR TWO THINGS:**

**1\. Sorry I haven't updated in like a month! I promise to get he next chapter up within the next three days.**

**2\. Sorry for my phone glitching and reposting the last chapter. Oops lol.**

**I do not own Danny Phantom.**

**Chapter 19**

Third Person P.O.V.

When Tucker collapsed, there was utter chaos.

The humans who had been hiding in the cave decided that they were no longer safe there and ran out into the forest. They started dropping like stones as the firing became more intense and unpredictable.

Valerie picked up Tucker's limp form and ran into the trees. Jazz, meanwhile, ran over to Skulker and Ember to come up with a plan of some sorts. The two ghosts had been struggling to keep a hold on Danny, who was still trapped in Skulker's smaller body. Skulker looked confused when Jazz grabbed her possessed younger brother from his grip and ran back in the woods. The two ghosts followed suit.

Skulker's battle armour lay forgotten a few feet from the cave entrance.

"What do we do about him?!" Skulker asked Jazz. Dark Danny was continuing to struggle and yell in Skulker's firm grasp.

Jazz ducked under a blast from the Pinks, then said: "We have to regroup with the others before we do anything about Dark Danny. Now come on!"

They ran towards a group of humans that they'd see bolt into the forest, when suddenly-

"Time out!"

The blasts that had already been fired stopped in midair and all the fleeing humans paused.

Dark Danny stopped screaming profanities through Skulker's tiny body.

Clockwork, who was standing in the centre of the still clearing, stumbled. His power had already been low, but he'd forced himself to step in, if only slightly.

He floated over to Jazz and plucked Dark Danny from her hand, replacing him with a note.

"Time in!"

And he was gone.

Everyone kept running, and Jazz looked down at where her brother used to be in panic.

She opened the note, and read it as quickly as she could.

"Dear Jasmine,

I can't become as involved as I would like to be, but I can rid you of one of your biggest problems, Dark Danny, temporarily.

I am bringing him to the Observants on the other side of the island. I have sent Wulf your way and I have given him enough strength to send you all through at once. Also, I will transport all of the free humans to the same spot after I leave you. Wulf will be there shortly.

Take charge, care for the wounded, and be a leader in your brother's' absence.

I believe you can do it. Good luck.

Clockwork"

She barely had time to fold the letter from the Time Master before her vision clouded, and she opened her eyes in a clearing full of injured and uninjured humans.

Time to get to work.

DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPD

Sam and her Mother were walking along an insanely narrow path in the sewer.

"So, Sammy, where are you taking us again?"

"The eastern Amity border. We'll be safe there because of how unpopulated it is. There are some landfills, some broken down buildings, and very little people so there will probably be less soldiers around."

"Oh."

There was silence for a few minutes as the pair continued walking.

A rat scurried by. I winced as my mother began screaming profanities in such a tight, damp space. The screams echoed.

"Mom! Stop it! Do you want them to come down here and find us? God, use your brain!" Sam snapped. She was tired, she was in the middle of her cycle, she was wounded and she was mad. Mad at the Leader, at her mother and most of all, at herself for getting caught in the first place.

"Sammy!-"

"Mom just shut u-"

Suddenly she was in the filthy sewer water. It was dark, and she didn't know which way was up. She tried to tell if she was getting deeper or not with the water pressure, but she was panicking too much to be sure.

Suddenly, she felt a firm grip on her ankle and suddenly her foot broke the surface. Relieved, Sam swam upwards until the rest of her was out of the water as well.

Her mother helped drag her out of the water and back onto the narrow path. Sam was panting, taking in all the oxygen that she could get.

Sam looked to where she'd fallen in and saw the pipe that she must have tripped on.

So that's what her mother had been trying to tell her.

She sighed. "Sorry. I guess I'm just kind of stressed out. I won't snap at you anymore."

Pamela smiled at her daughter and gave her the biggest hug of her life.

"I love you, Sam. Don't scare me like that again."

The two shared a moment where they were both happy with each other, feeling none of their normal frustrations with each other. It was perfect...

Until suddenly Sam's world went white.

DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP

"HEY!" Jazz screamed at the crowd.

No one heard her. People were bustling around the clearing, either looking for their loved ones or just crying.

"HEEEEYYY!" Jazz tried again.

A few heads turned and holding on to that tiny ray of hope, Jazz screamed at the top of her lungs for everyone to shut up, and those who didn't hear her were silenced by those who did.

Jazz smiled in relief, despite her raw throat. She lowered her voice to a yell and called out "Thanks to the help of Clockwork, the ghost of time, we are all here together. Anyone with any medical training, help the wounded. Anyone healthy, transport the wounded to one place, and try to build some kind of shelter over them. Wulf is on his way with enough magic power to send us all back at once, but we don't know how long we'll have to wait for him to get here. If you haven't found your loved ones yet, you will eventually, because Clockwork specifically said-" she was cut off when, all of a sudden, a whole new group of humans walked into the clearing whom she didn't recognize.

Everyone looked at the group in confusion. They looked back at us in bewilderment. They were moments from confronting them when another group emerged from the trees as well. Three more groups of around twenty emerged from the trees, and a few smaller groups of less.

Tucker, Valerie and Jazz almost cried in joy when Sam and Pamela Manson came through the trees, but were furious when that saw how badly Sam was injured.

Clockwork watched from above, knowing that he could not influence time for the next while for the fear of losing balance, even though he knew how grave of a mistake he'd made.

He'd brought every single free human that lived in Amity park. He watched in sadness as another group, this time with close to fifty people.

He'd brought over one hundred more humans into the Ghost Zone.

Even with the extra strength from the Observants, Wulf would destabilize, maybe even melt, from using too much power if he tried to send that many humans back to the Human Realm.


	20. Strike Team

**SORRY THIS IS SO LATE!**

**I was unexpectedly busy over the summer, but now I think you guys can expect the updates weekly again. Once again, sorry that I didn't get this up as soon as I said I would!**

**(Third Person)**

As all the humans were chatting happily with their friends that had just been brought over to the Zone, Jazz was stressed beyond words. She'd figured out for herself what all the extra humans meant for Wulf, and she was trying to think of ways to fix it. She'd recruited Sam (whose injuries had been looked over in the medical area, but not much could be done with the limited amount of supplies) Tucker and Valerie as well to try and think of an answer. The concerned and thoughtful expressions of all the 'Teens Upstairs' had drawn a small crowd of adults over to them. Included in that small crowd was William Lancer, Maddie Fenton, Pamela Manson, Damon Gray and the Ferones.

"So, basically, the issue is that even with his amplified power, Wulf can't bring all the old and newly brought over humans back at the same time. If he over exerts himself he could de-stabilize and vanish." Sam explained to the crowd of twenty or so people.

"It's just a ghost; who gives a damn if the filth dies?! We need to get home!" Maddie said, gaining the support of several other humans in the crowd.

"No, Mom. We are not sacrificing Wulf. He has been kind enough to offer us his help and we are _not_ taking advantage of him." Jazz said, keeping her voice low and serious.

The calm fury in Jazz's tone silenced her mother, killing any opposition about the teen's choice. The adults that had sided with Maddie all looked away guiltily.

"Anyways," Sam continued, "any suggestions are very much appreciated."

"Well, I think the answer is simple," Damon said confidently. "We assemble a strike team to go home, beat the Leader and come back for the rest of the humans."

"What about the humans here? We can't just leave them with no protection." Tucker pointed out.

Damon shrugged. "We'll find a way to keep them hidden. The fact of the matter is that we have more humans than we can handle here, we don't have a way to transport them and we can't just wait around for us all to die. We hardly have any food, we have no water and we're all sleep deprived. If we assemble a strike team, we can send them through first and get all the trouble back home dealt with while Wulf builds up enough power to send the rest home."

"I think that's a good plan. I mean, Wulf would still be here with them and he's pretty strong. We will probably enlist some of the stronger ghosts into the strike team, but there will still be some around to watch for trouble." Jazz reasoned.

"I guess it's settled, now we just have to assemble the team," Valerie said optimistically.

"I've already got that covered," Tucker said, looking up from his PDA. "I've got a list here that should be the most effective, logistically speaking. There will be eleven humans and nine ghosts. For humans, we'll have me, Sam Manson, Jazz Fenton, Red, Maddie Fenton, Damon Gray, Dash Baxter, James Ferone, Paul Bentley and once we reach Amity Park, Danny Fenton."

The cacophonous complaints of the humans were like nothing Team Phantom had ever heard, besides Danny's wail.

"Oh my God!" Maddie Fenton's panicked shout broke its way throughout the entire crowd, silencing everyone.

"What is it Ms. F?" Tucker asked, suddenly very worried. Ms. Fenton could be a bit oblivious at times, but she was certainly smart. Did they miss something..?

"All the freed humans came back here, didn't they? So Danny should be here."

The crowd was silent. Everyone looked around to see if they could spot the youngest Fenton.

"If he's not here, then he's...?" She trailed off, her voice breaking.

All the humans that had heard about Danny, suddenly realizing that there were still people they hadn't found in the crowd, started running around frantically in search of their loved ones. The panic mood passed on to all the rest of the humans, even those who hadn't heard what Maddie said, and chaos ensued. People were trampling each other and calling for their friends and family.

Sam, Tucker, Jazz and Valerie all gawked at how quickly things had gone to hell.

"You are all hilariously bad at being in charge."

The four spun around to see Vlad Masters, in human form, smirking at the crowd.

"What the hell are you doing here?!"

DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP

Danny's P.O.V.

I have never been so grateful for the existence of Skulker and Ember.

I watched everything unfold from above after having been kicked out of my own body. When Ember attacked through Lily's body, I was surprised. Thankfully, so was the demon.

Who knows what he would have done to the humans if he'd had more time.

Then suddenly Jazz had grabbed Dark Danny from Skulker and I was being pulled along too. Then I was grabbed again by Clockwork, who replaced me with a note in Jazz's hand.

I suddenly saw all the humans from the area disappear, and I could guess what had happened.

Clockwork flew over to the clearing where he'd transported all the humans. I looked around for my friends but before I could find them, Clockwork had already started flying away with a concerned expression.

As Clockwork was flying me to an unknown location, the Demon was being strangely silent.

Clockwork scoffed, "You're a bit old to be pouting like this, Drekavac."

...Gesundheit?

"I just had a year's worth of planning put to waste by a child. How would you feel?" Dark Danny said with a growl.

"The only time that's happened to me, Danny Phantom was the child. In the end, it worked out for the best, so I didn't mind."

The demon in Skulker's body smirked. "That's the difference between you and me, Barīrītu. You make plans that are designed for a happy outcome. My plans make people suffer-"

"And look at how far that's gotten you in the past ten thousand years."

More silence.

"Clockwork?" I decided to try to talk to my mentor. There was no response from the time ghost.

"Don't bother, kid. He can't hear you." Dark Danny said aloud. I looked down at him in surprise and he was staring right at me.

Clockwork followed his eyes, but when he looked in my direction I could tell that he couldn't see me. He was looking straight through me. Clockwork turned back to the demon angrily. "Has Danny been calling for me this entire time?"

"Nah, he only decided to try just now. He looks kind of surprised that I can see him. You'd think that to be a given, hm?"

My face turned sour and I glared at the monster that took over my body. "Have you had enough fun for today? I kinda have some work to do back home and I'd appreciate a corporeal form to do it in."

"Nope. Unfortunately for you, a demon never breaks a promise and I made one to that Leader guy. I have to stay and make the rest of his afterlife hell for not returning one Sam Manson in the given time limit."

"You were there for that?" I asked, almost not surprised.

"Of course I was there. I always was. Now shut up, I have to focus on convincing your friend, here, to let me go kick the Leader's ass."

"What happened to your big 'take over the universe' plans from before? Why are you only concerned with the Leader now?"

The demon rolled his eyes. "Ok, kid. I'll try to make this explanation as simple as possible for you. The Leader, for reasons you don't need to know, needs to be taken down because it could negatively affect _me_ if he completes his domination of the Human Realm. You were the best plan I could think of because I knew that he would make a move against you soon enough. I started to follow you around a bit, learning the way you think and act. Then, when your mind was most vulnerable, I made my move and planted myself in there."

"Vulnerable?"

"When you were pissed off at a couple moronic human teenagers for pretty much attempting suicide in a blizzard. Your anger temporarily removed your mental walls, which were extremely impressive, by the way. Taught to you by the old time master himself, eh?"

I nodded.

"Right. Anyways, I basically planted myself in there so that when you confronted the Leader, I could take the bastard by surprise. He wouldn't be able to sense me until it was too late because I was in your mind. He knows I'm after him, and hiding inside your skin was a pretty clever plan if I do say so myself."

"Why did you take over if you were waiting for me to make my move!?" I growled. What was the point of waiting dormant all that time if he was just going to start screwing with me now?!

"Got tired of waiting. I'm a demon, we're not exactly known for our patience. Why should I have to sit around watching you shit everything up when I can just take down the bastard and be down with it?"

"You didn't need to get involved in the first place! The guy isn't strong enough to beat me, the only reason he escaped the first time we fought was because he played my humanity like a goddamned violin. As soon as I have Sam back, I'll just go beat him to the ninth circle of hell and neither of us will ever have to deal with him again."

"You honestly think it'll be that simple? You're more naïve than I thought. You obviously haven't heard the news of the Leader's newest chess piece..."

"Enough, Drekavac. Danny, don't stress yourself over anything this demon says. The Observants will have him out of you in no time, then we'll get you back into you." He said the last part with a chuckle, motioning at Skulker's tiny body.

I tried to calm down, but with Dark Danny (or 'Drekavac', as Clockwork kept calling him) smirking at me, it certainly wasn't easy.

Clockwork suddenly changed his course, moving back towards the ground. He landed right at the entrance of a cave, and it didn't take me long to realize that we were back at the cave where we'd left the comatose ghosts behind. It had certainly changed, now there were Observants bustling about and talking amongst themselves.

All conversation and movement halted when Clockwork came into sight.

Clockwork spoke loud enough for all the surrounding Observants to hear, "We have to move quickly. First, we must banish the demon Drekavac from his Highness's mind, then we must gather our forces and help lead the humans to victory. Where is Arthur?"

An abnormally large Observant (I assume the Head Observant) stepped out of the crowd. Completely ignoring Clockworks question, he said: "You seem to have this all planned out. What guarantee do we have that while your power of seeing the future seems to be missing in action that anything you come up with will have a good outcome?"

"As soon as the Leader's influence is dealt with, my power will slowly but surely be restored. To accomplish that, we need my mentee in prime condition. A demon plaguing his mind won't help anyone, so that should be first on our agenda. Second of all, from what I saw back at the human camp, they plan on assembling a strike team to go back so that Wulf remains safe. This plan will put their weakest all in one place, and so to put the strike team's mind at ease, we will go protect those who can't protect themselves. Have I made my plans so far sound reasonable enough to you?"

The head observant, though not capable of showing emotion, bristled. "Fine. We will dispel this demon for you. We'll need the host." The Observant held out his hand.

Clockwork looked him over warily, obviously not fully trusting the ghost councilman. I noticed one observant float forward slightly, catching Clockworks eye. The observant nodded at Clockwork, and I understood immediately.

That's the observant from before... Archie?

Good lord, I have the worst memory in the entire Ghost Zone. How am I going to _survive_ as the _Ghost King_?!

"Arthur." Whispered Drekavac. He looked up at me, smirking at my confused but relieved look. "I'm living in your head, obviously I can hear your thoughts."

Suddenly I was jerked forward as Clockwork held out Skulker's body to the Observant. The time master growled at the Observant: "If my charge is harmed whatsoever, I will end you. Don't believe that I won't. As soon as you're done, turn Drekavac over to me. I will deal with him myself."

The Head Observant nodded and walked into the cave with five other Observants. I was pulled in as well, and the last thing I saw before all the light in the cave dissolved was Clockwork, staring after us with genuine concern.

DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP

Sam's P.O.V.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I asked the oldest halfa, who had just appeared out of nowhere a few moments ago.

"Well, I wasn't under the mind spell, and now thanks to the Time Master, here I am."

We all glared at the man, for a few moments, sizing him up.

Vlad, taking in our reactions, sighed in exasperation. He stepped up onto the rock we were all sitting on and called out to the crowd. "Citizens of Amity Park!"

Upon hearing the voice of their mayor, people started to calm themselves down. Soon, the clearing was silent save for a few murmurs.

Tucker cried out indignantly. "Why would they listen to _you_ and not me?!"

"Because you're a child, obviously, whereas I'm a mature, responsible adult. It's not rocket science." Vlad returned his attention to the expectant crowd. "Now, then. If you will do as I tell you, then you will see your families and friends soon enough, safe and sound. For right now, though, you cannot panic. Your panic only means the demise of your loved ones. We need everything to be organized so that our strike team doesn't have to worry about us while they're gone."

"Woah, back up. You're going along with the strike team plan?" I asked incredulously, trying to stand up. I flash of pain shot through my wounded leg, so I eased myself back down.

"You ok?" Valerie whispered from next to me. I was about to nod, but Valerie gave me an 'if-you-aren't-honest-with-me-I-will-cut-you' sort of look, and I shrugged.

"Honestly, I'm not sure. My leg really hurts…"

Valerie looked me over, taking in my appearance. I was sure that I must be fairly pale, my hair matted and still wet from when I fell into the sewer water (which was surprisingly deep) and my shoulder and leg wounds were both still bleeding slightly. The medical team didn't have any stitches of any sort, so I was stuck with bandages.

"Tucker, we're taking Sam off the Strike list. She can't fight in her condition."

"What!? V- … That's not true!" I cried out indignantly.

Tucker and Vlad looked over at us.

"I agree. She doesn't look like she's in condition to walk, nevermind fight. I say we leave her here to be further treated." Vlad said after a moments' consideration.

"Well, I vote that if Vlad thinks I should stay, then I should go," I said this while standing up to prove my point. I ignored the pain in my leg and faced Vlad with a victorious smirk."

Tucker looked worried. "You sure about this, Sam? We'd understand if you couldn't go and so would Danny. In fact, I think he'd kill me if I let you come with us while you're that injured."

"Danny isn't here right now and I'm telling you that I'm good to go." I looked out at the crowd. Most people had started their own quiet conversations, while lots that knew us were watching our conversation intently. I noticed our English class closer to the front. Dani (Tucker explained that situation to her earlier) was looking thoroughly annoyed at the teens she was being forced to hang around, Paulina appeared to be in the middle of one of her rants, and the jocks seemed to be entertaining themselves by throwing a rock around like a football. Most of the others, including Lancer, were staring right back at me. I saw mom close by as well, trying to hide her tears as she watched me wobble a bit. A few other adults that knew me wore concerned looks as well.

"Fine. If you feel that strongly about it, then you can come. I don't want to spend any more time debating than we have to, so Mr. Foley...?" Vlad said, motioning at Tucker's PDA.

"Right, the list. Ok, I already read the human half of the list, so this is the ghost half. Keep in mind, we aren't sure that we'll be able to get ahold of everyone on this list because we have no way of knowing where they are. We'll just have to hope that they come with the others."

"The others?" A random woman in the crowd asked.

"A few days ago I organized a search- a team of ghosts were sent out to find other ghosts and tell them to all group together here. I think that most of the ghosts who can actually think were contacted, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they'll come." Tucker looked back to his PDA. "For the nine ghosts of the Team, we'll have Skulker, Technus, Ember, Young Blood, Johnny, Kitty, Arthur, Frostbite and Dora. Once again, this list isn't set in stone. We have to get organized so that we can deal with any road blocks at a moment's notice."

"I'm afraid we've already got one," Vlad said, looking up at Tucker incredulously.

"And what would that be?" Valerie lashed, obviously not in the mood for talking to Vlad.

Vlad scoffed. "Well, it seems you've all been living under a rock for the past three days. Have you not heard about the Far Frozen?"

"That it melted? Yeah, we heard. We also heard that the Yeti's have relocated to Dora's Realm. Is there something else?"

"Apparently you _were_ living under a rock. The Far Frozen was ambushed on their way to Dora's. Either the entire Yeti population was kidnapped or they were entirely wiped out. Either way, they never made it to Princess Dora's Realm."

There was complete silence, and then:

"_What_?!"

Team Phantom turned around to see Danny Fenton standing at the treeline, and the biggest collection of ghosts that anyone there had ever seen stepped into view behind him.


	21. Onward

**RECAP BECAUSE I HAVEN'T POSTED IN FOREVER (sorry!)**

-Danny has returned to the group after the observants kicked the demon out of his head.

-Vlad just showed up

-Dani is still overshadowing Dash

-All the free humans of Amity Park are all gathered together in the Ghost Zone along with an army of ghosts

-Sam was injured escaping the Leader

-Leader has the surviving Yeti's

-Amity Park is about to be a war zone (dun dun duuuunnnnn)

**Quick note- I'm going to stop promising sooner updates because things always get in the way of my writing time and I can't control that, soooo I'll just keep updating when I can. I WILL FINISH THIS STORY.**

**I was just rereading the story a bit when I discovered that back in chapter 14,** _**I broke one of Dash's legs in four places and I completely forgot about it until now.**_ **Let's all just pretend I never did that. Side note: I warned you at the very start of this story that this is my first ever fic and that it wouldn't be perfect. BTW if I seem to have forgotten anything else that I put near the start of this, review and remind me. Again, sorry, and on to the story!**

"Alright, Wulf. Open the portal." Danny Fenton called to Wulf, waving in a way that said 'let's just get this over with'. There were two Danny's standing in front of the Strike Team (which was _finally _ready to head into the war zone), one human and one ghost. The clone took the role of Danny Fenton so that they could remain separated for longer.

Since Danny had gotten back to them with his mind fully intact, Team Phantom had spent hours brainstorming a plan. Surprisingly, it wasn't them who came up with their strategy.

It was Pamela Manson. She'd interrupted the meeting between two Danny's, Sam, Tucker, Valerie and Dani and said that she had an idea. She'd given them an ultimatum: if they used her plan, Sam would stay behind with Dr. Bentley for further treatment. The strategy she suggested was relatively airtight as long as everyone played their parts right, so Sam agreed to stay behind.

A few adjustments had been made to Tucker's original Strike Team, but it was mostly the same. In it's human half, the team consisted of Danny (Fenton), Tucker, Jazz, Valerie, Maddie, Damon Gray, Dash (Dani), James Ferone and Pamela. The ghost half of the team included Danny (Phantom), Skulker (in a brand new battle suit), Ember, Johnny, Kitty, Arthur, Dora and Vlad _Plasmius_. Vlad offered to come in his ghost form to help them out, causing immense suspicion among the teens at first. Vlad explained that all of his plans had been put on hold since there were no pawns to carry them out for him, so it would be in his interests to deal with the mind control issue as soon as possible. Seeing as Vlad knew Amity Park better than most of the other ghosts did, they agreed to let him come along.

So there they stood in the center of clearing, while the remaining humans had been separated into groups according to the strategy. The ghost army spread themselves out into a circle to guard the clearing, watching and waiting for enemy movement.

Wulf nodded to Danny and extended his claws. He slashed the air in front of him and a large portal opened up.

"Ok, guys, let's get this bastard out of our town." Danny Fenton called out to the human half of the Strike Team. The humans all went through, then Danny Phantom turned to the ghosts.

"Remember, killing the soldiers is not our goal. Keep the strategy in mind and for God's sake, stick to it." Phantom half-pleaded with his part of the team. Most of them responded in snorts and sarcastic remarks about 'trust' and 'faith' before passing through the portal as well.

Danny paused for a moment, then turned around. Sam was standing not far off, and she was staring at him. He saluted in her direction, and she gave a weak smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. Danny paused, entirely ready to go to her instead of to the Human Realm, but she shook her head, and she saluted back.

Danny frowned in concern, before reluctantly flew through the portal.

When Danny came out the other side, he immediately knew that this wouldn't be easy.

They were standing on Perion Drive, a road that he, Tucker and Sam often walked along on their way to school.

It was swarming with Pink Soldiers. The battle had begun before he'd even arrived.

Danny saw the plan starting up. The Strike Force humans were shooting Skulkers Stun Guns from the Island, and calling out names at random (this was mostlt Pamela, of course). Dora was already circling Amity, avoiding gunfire (as much as a giant dragon could) and breathing fire to push the drones towards the portal. The other ghosts flew through the hordes of drones at top speed, picking up people as they went. Then, when they were full handed, they'd fly the humans back to the portal and throw them through. On the other side of the portal, the more powerfully built humans would secure the drones (whose only weapons didn't affect humans), socialites would run around and identify them, and medically capable people would treat any wounds as quickly as possible. Everyone who didn't really fit into a category would just try to identify their family and friends and loan extra hands where needed. Most of the extra ghosts were sent out in groups to search the Ghost Zone for drones.

Things seemed to be working so far. The drone numbers were dropping, either stunned or woken up. The problem was that they were appearing almost as fast as they were falling.

Danny spotted Tucker in the human portion of the strike team and flew over.

"How are we doing? Should I grab Dani and Vlad yet or should we wait?"

Tucker fired off another round of shots before answering. "Well, maybe you should go grab Dani sooner rather than later, man. It'll probably take you more time than we've got to reason with Dash, so you'd better get started."

Danny sighed in annoyance, knowing without a doubt that his friend was right. "Roger that."

Leaving his friend to deal with an incoming wave of drones, Danny flew off to where he last saw Danielle. Spotting her not too far away, he swooped down and intangibly took her through the ground, bringing her back up in an alleyway.

"Danny? What's going on?"

"You're coming with me to the Diskell Building to help me weed out the Leader. I need you; the problem is that Dash needs to be here."

"Oh, is that all? No prob." With that, Dani floated out of Dash's body. Danny immediately panicked, of course.

Dash surprised him, though.

Instead of attacking outright, Dash paused and considered his newfound freedom. Then, he nodded at Danny and ran back to rejoin the battle.

Danny stood there, completely shell shocked. What had just happened?

Dani called out for Dash to wait, and he did. She ran up to him and _kissed him._

_In front of Danny._

**(A/N: Sorry, I couldn't resist ;) If you don't like, let me know and I won't make it a big thing.)**

Danny got more nauseous every second that the two were touching each other.

Dani broke away from the jock and grinned, one which he returned tenfold.

"Be careful," She warned as he ran off to the battle.

After a few moments of silence, Danny growled: "_Explain._"

Danielle sighed. "Danny, he's a nice guy. You just have to get to know him a bit-"

"Dash is not a 'nice guy'. Anything he told you was probably just to earn your trust."

Dani was about to argue, but Danny cut her off. "We can talk about this later, ok? The Leader has probably got his hands full with keeping his army under his control, so now is our window of opportunity. Let's go save the yetis and take down this mind controlling bastard so we can get back to our lives, ok?"

"Fine."

With that, she flew off towards the Diskell Building, where according to Pamela Manson, our enemy lay waiting. I quickly picked Vlad out of the battle and followed closely behind, a disapproving scowl etched onto my face the entire time.

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Dash ran back off to the battle, his head still spinning from what had just happened.

Danielle just kissed him. Did this make them a thing, or..?

In the back of his mind, there was a part of him that was afraid for his life considering the shocked and disgusted expression Fenton had been wearing. Everywhere else, though, was just thrilled.

Getting kidnapped might just be the best thing that had ever happened to him. He'd been pissed off at first, but that was mostly while the Fenton/Phantom news had been sinking in. As he became more and more aware of what was going on, he relaxed more and more. Danielle was laid back, funny and Dash had thought she was the prettiest girl he'd ever seen the first time he saw her. The more they got to know each other, the more he liked her.

Apparently she felt the same way, and Dash had never been more excited in his life.

Before now, if Dash had been freed, he would have told everyone about Danny as fast as he could. He didn't because he finally saw what Danny had been talking about when he was first discovered; Danielle and the rest of them didn't deserve to be killed for what they can't help being. The more Dash thought about what he'd done and said, the worse he felt. In his frustration with himself, he sent out an array of stun bullets. He didn't aim, he just shot. Several bullets flew past any possible targets which served to fuel Dash's frustration further.

He didn't even know what had happened until he heard the closest human to him, James Ferone, cursed and ran over.

"Dash?" He called out questioningly.

"What?" Dash snapped at the teacher, firing off another round.

It was then that the jock saw his arm, or rather didn't see his arm.

"Shit," Ferone cursed under his breath. He panicked a bit and ran up to where he heard Dash's voice, incidentally running right into him. Mr. Ferone wasn't a short guy, but he was certainly shorter than Dash and much thinner so running into the jock would have felt similar to running into a brick wall.

Dash almost laughed, but then the reality of his situation sunk in further. He was invisible and he _really_ didn't want to be. How long would it be before Ms. Fenton noticed? Or anyone else in the crowd with a functioning brain? What if the drones remembered everything they saw while they were under the mind spell?!

"Dash! Dash, calm down!" Mr. Ferone said in an alarmed tone. He looked around at the drones closing in on us, then turned back in my general direction. In a hushed voice he said, "Danielle, what the hell is going on, here?"

"It's not Danielle. She went to help Danny take down the Leader. These aren't her powers, they're mine!" Dash mumbled in an urgent tone. "And I don't know how to turn them off!"

"Alright Dash, relax, you're going to be ok. Danny must have something to do with this, did he teach you anything about controlling these powers?"

I thought back to just before I'd been overshadowed. I'd been getting pointers from Danny about my invisibility when I found out about him, hadn't I? I thought back, trying desperately to remember whilst simultaneously shouting down oncoming drones.

Then it hit me: '_Using these powers is a totally psychological thing. Like, to avoid going invisible by mistake, just imagine yourself there. Imagine everyone watching you._'

Dash did as Danny's voice instructed in his mind, and before he knew it his arm was right back in place, shooting drones as they approached. He heard Mr. Ferone breathe a sigh of relief before firing off a few more rounds himself.

"I'll explain later…" Dash told the teacher.

"Damn right, you will."

**DPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDPDP**

Danny flew intangibly at top speed through the Diskell building, checking every room for his prey. Dani was off searching for the yeti's, giving Danny the freedom to search for the leader without having to worry about them.

The next room he flew into seemed to be someone's office. Pausing for a moment, he dropped to the ground and glanced around the room. There didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary about it; there were some chairs, a bookshelf, a desk in the corner, etc. Taking a closer look at the desk, there was a framed photo of a family of three. They all looked exceptionally happy, and that bothered Danny a surprise amount.

Why couldn't he ever feel happy like that? Everyone's lives were constantly at stake. There was always someone's life to be responsible for, always obstacles keeping him from ever really enjoying himself. Why was that? Had his partial death pissed off some higher power, somewhere? Did the universe hate him for trying to play hero? _What had he done wrong?!_

In a sudden burst of frustration, Danny punched the wall. His fist put a softball-size dent in the wood.

"Danny? You ok?" A small voice asked from next to him.

Danielle had come out of seemingly nowhere, but Danny didn't so much as flinch when she spoke up. He just sighed in resignation and turned to his clone.

"I'm fine. Did you find Frostbite and the others?"

"I found most of them. They're in a cooler in the basement."

"How many missing?"

"Just Frostbite. I'm sorry Danny, I know how important he is to you-"

The rest of what Dani said fell on deaf ears. Danny was breaking apart, but he kept his face straight. He had to hold it together for Danielle's sake, for the Strike Team's sake, for Frostbite's sa-

Danny's whole body convulsed in a sob. He was in charge. Every death was his fault. Everyone's safety was his burden.

Everyone who'd put their trust in him was his responsibility.

"I can't do this. I can't do this, I'm falling apart and I can't hold everyone together when I'm falling apart. Everyone is going to be dead or _his _slave and it's going to be my loss. It's going to be _my loss_, because _somehow_, everything is _always on me_!" Danny sunk to the floor, leaning on the wall he'd just hit. "I'm strong. I know I am, I'm going to rule the underworld one day, dammit. They don't just give that kind of responsibility to just anyone. I'm strong, Dani, but I'm not invincible. Time after time he's used my humanity to escape. Anyone could do what he's doing… Hell, I'm sure half the Ghost Zone could pull this off…" Danny paused again, thinking about what point he was trying to make.

He looked up at Dani and said, "The only thing that makes me strong also makes me weak, so how am I supposed to win?"


End file.
